Inner Darkness
by JMK758
Summary: Gibbs and the Team work to unravel the mysterious death of a woman impersonating an NCIS Agent even as they monitor Tim McGee after his experience as an Elf Lord.
1. Break In

This is my ninth NCIS story, not counting non-Mysteries, all following one progression. The list grew so extensive I moved it, with summaries, to my profile.  
NCIS is © Belisarius Productions. I own Siobhan (Sha-vawn) O'Mallory and any Agents not shown on the screen.  
Please Review.  
Rating: T or NCis-17. Death, Violence, Intrigue, Attempted Rape.

Inner Darkness  
By: JMK758  
Prologue

The Elf Lord was victorious in his Quest, saved and won the lovely Princess Mairenn and inherited the Kingdom of Men but Tim McGee is in Hell.

He shoves open the door to his apartment and throws his wallet, keys, shield case and weapon on the edge of his computer workstation. A crack to the head had given him an amazing adventure, battle against the forces of Darkness; 'And I can't remember any of it.'

Looking about his bland apartment, he wonders if life would be better had he stayed in Dubhrein.

'Okay, no, that's petty. They risked - who knows what - to save me. Tony could well be dead if I was better with that sword or Zee's plan didn't work. But it's really unfair that I lived the most incredible adventure of my life and I don't remember _any _of it!'

He rips off his shirt, clenches it in his left fist. 'I can know what Cearbhall was like, I created him. I can know how he spoke, I know his Quest, I did it all but I have to depend on everyone else's stories of my daring exploits.'

He heads for his bedroom and the hot bath beyond. 'But it all comes back to plain old McGee, the Cosmic Nerd of Googlespace. 'Maybe I need a new personality, something more befitting a Special Agent. Maybe I'll Gibbsify myself, see what adventur– '

The naked blonde woman lieing upon his bed is a perfect twenty. "Hello," she purrs hotly enough to melt the paint off his walls.

x

'I'm hallucinating again. Come on, I can't be hallucinating. The doctors said I was okay. _Ducky _says I'm okay. Tony's right, I should've refused to go in.' He stares at the naked woman, upping her from a twenty to a twenty-five. 'Well, if this is a hallucination I hope I remember _this _one.'

"How did you get in here?" 'Just in case she's not an illusion. She _looks _real. She can't be real.'

"I let myself in," she breathes, scorching the air. She slithers off the bed and slinks toward him, her body moving to a sensual inner rhythm only she can hear but which he's starting to appreciate.

But he's annoyed. 'Okay, she's sexy but I didn't put her here!' He's mad that his sanctum has been invaded. She further invades his personal space, presses her naked body to him.

'She's real all right.' He grabs her shoulders - if she were a dream he'd grab other things - and pushes her away.

"Well, then you can let yourself back _out_. Did Tony put you up to this? I don't think it's funny."

She pouts but gets close to him again, puts her arms about his neck. She moves her body seductively against him, her hips stroke him. He supposes she's fertile because she's trying to make him grow.

"What's wrong? Don't you think I'm beautiful?"

Tim doesn't think he has been asked an easier question in years. 'If this _is _for real I'm going to have my head examined - again - but: "I think you're gorgeous - and if I had _invited_ you to my apartment –." Even in his annoyance he feels a chill of apprehension. What if Ziva shows up now?

"Then what's wrong, Thom?" she coos. "Don't you like me?" She tries to kiss him, but he pushes her back harder than before. Even if he were going to get into it, the moment's shattered.

"What did you call me?"

"Thom. You're exactlylike your picture, Thom Gemcity." She looks him over, clearly appreciating what she's found, pointedly giving her attention to one particular part of him.

Tim sighs. He'd been annoyed to find an unexpected - unwelcome - and naked - visitor in his bedroom. Now he's mad. She's not here to see him, she's here to see '_Gemcity'_.

He's already had a nightmare experience with an obsessed - though fortunately not naked - fan. Abby almost died because of that obsession, and then there was Cearbhall. 'I definitely need to Gibbsify myself. Things like this never happen to him.

x

"How did you find me?" Gemcity isn't listed in the phone book. Neither, come to that, is McGee.

"I followed you. I've been following you for days, trying to work up the nerve to visit you." She slips past his restraining grip, presses her firm and impressive chest to his and her warm lips cover his.

He pushes her away again. While normally not averse to the attention of a beautiful naked woman, his appreciation is shorted out by his annoyance at her intrusion – and how Ziva would undoubtedly react if she were to drop in.

"'Visit' is one thing, but if you've followed me for days - something I do _not _appreciate - you must know by now there is no 'Thom E. Gemcity'. That's a name I use for my books."

"I don't care," she breathes ardently and closes the gap between them, holds him close to her heat, her words barely intelligible through burning lips working his. "I want to have your baby."

Chapter One  
Break in

The morning sun shines brightly through the plate glass window and door into the white-on-white shop. Having a store that faces the strip mall's tremendous parking lot is a true advantage for any Bridal shop owner and Ann DuPres can't be happier.

'A Touch of Elegance' Bridal Salon is busy; Autumn being an opportune time for marriages. The sweltering heat of Summer is just a memory but with snow many weeks away they'll do most of their business during these months.

This morning, with three fittings scheduled, one a final, plus two new customers to whom to introduce the pleasures and benefits of the shop and three alterations from last week well in progress, the shop is a beehive of activity. Ann loves every second of it.

'Touch' is the only Bridal Salon in more than three miles, set conspicuously in the middle of the strip mall off Interstate 50, tucked between a Tuxedo Rental shop on the left, of which she owns a one-third interest, and a Circuit City on the right. They're clearly visible from the highway on the opposite side of the parking lot. The location is perfect and today Ann expects to net five figures. With the least expensive dress in the shop priced at $3,000 before expensive fittings and alterations, this is developing into a very pleasant morning.

Her good mood, as she moves from customer to customer, carries her right up until a tinkle of breaking glass behind her. It comes from a small round hole punched through the large display window and as she starts to turn there's the sharp crack of a hole being punched in the sheetrock wall at the rear of the shop. Just as she looks from the source of one sound to the other the plate glass window implodes.

A green Chevy Blazer rockets into the shop amidst a billion glass shards. Tiny missiles precede the huge juggernaut that obliterates three mannequins and the front rack. Startled shrieks rise, employees and customers dive for safety. The car blasts on. Gloves, silken purses and white shoes on a display table blast in all directions. The car smashes through the rear checkout counter. The maelstrom of noise climaxes in a titanic crash as it smashes through the rear wall and buries itself deep in the inner office.

As the staggering noise dissolves into falling debris, moaning and frightened crying, the pleasant scents of the shop are overwhelmed by exhaust fumes and pulverized sheet rock. Ann looks up from the floor where she had thrown herself. She looks about, relieved there are no bodies littering the shop, no blood marring the white carpet.

She's sure there will be, however. She scrambles to her feet as quickly as her high heels will allow her and advances on the green car in high fury. The car is buried to the windshield into what's left of her office wall.

There's a four-color circular emblem on the driver's door. It depicts a red, white and blue shield surmounted by a bald eagle. The outer border bears, as an upper arch and lower curve, the golden words: 'United States' and 'Naval Criminal Investigative Service'.

"You'd better have some good coverage, bitch," Ann grates as she stalks to the front door, able to see only a long haired head leaning back on the headrest, "because if you don–!"

Ann freezes when she sees the red haired woman still belted and harnessed in place. Her head has fallen back against the headrest. Her forehead is gone! Blood flows from the large hole extending from her hairline to her eyes, down her face and neck to gather into the collar of her white blouse.

Ann's screech can be heard through the adjacent stores.

xxx

"I tell you, Tony," Tim McGee assures his friend, "it was unreal, like something out of one of your movies."

"Not one of my movies, Probie," Tony denies. He doesn't waste time with 'that sort of movie', or so he would have his team mates believe, preferring the real thing.

However, though the story is interesting, of greater importance to DiNozzo at the moment is his constant, if subtle, watch of his friend. He and his partner's remain alert for any signs of uncommon behavior that might presage a relapse into the Probie's 'Sword & Sorcery persona'. It was just days ago that they'd journey's to the land of the evil Cormac Ciardha Dubhshlaine and Tony doesn't ever want to return.

Still, as a story, this one is much better. 'A naked, desperate woman waiting in his bed? How did the Probie get this lucky? "So what did you do?" He's ready for all the lurid details.

"Do?"

"'Do', McAuthor, a nice simple English word used to designate whatever it is you did."

"I made her put her clothes on and sent her home."

x

DiNozzo feels the anticipatory grin freeze solid upon his face. "You're kidding, right?" he asks, lips frozen in rictus smile. If this isn't a red flag, he doesn't know what is. "You feeling all right, McGoo?" This _has _to mean the 'Elf Lord' is back. What other explanation could justify that collossal–?

"No, Tony, I am not kidding, and I am not blind. She was pretty, but I happen to be in a relationship." He looks across the bullpen at Ziva, who nods appreciatively. "Besides, I was half expecting Ziva to drop in. I didn't want to know what would happen if she saw her."

"Ducky would have a guest this morning," the woman assures him, "and you would be wishing you were still an Elf Lord."

Tim spreads his hands. "I rest my case."

x

"Yeah, but - but McGee, come _on_." Tony continues to try to make the other man see reason, unable to believe what he's hearing. To him, it signals a relapse to Cearbhall, from whom none of the Agents are certain he has recovered. Despite McGee's claim to remember nothing of those two horrific days and his acceptance of Gibbs' contention that he's fit to return to work, DiNozzo does not trust it.

They had all spent two stressful days in the fictional landscape of McGee's most recent book when, following a severe blow to the head, he had believed himself to be the Elf Lord Greagoir Daibhidh Cearbhall. They'd each been forced to adopt the personae of the characters McGee had seen them as and to play out the drama to the end. It had, against odds, returned McGee to normal but completely without any memory of the incident.

Reverend Siobhan O'Mallory had also been written into the book without notice or permission, no surprise there. McGee had done the same to all of them in 'Deep Six' and its sequel 'Rock Hollow' and finally this unnamed Elf saga. Siobhan had appealed to him never to use her in one of his stories again and Tony can hardly blame her. The things written - and said - about her alter-ego had been embarrassingly romantic.

He considers it a little unfair, however, that of all those who had objected to appearing in McGee's tomes, she is probably the only one who has a reasonable hope of her request being granted.

McGee's only visible wound from that ordeal is two inches of square gauze on the back of his head; even the white band of gauze that had surrounded his head in the first days has been dispensed with. McGee had been annoyed that the substitution had come with the price of shaving a square area on the back of his head. He had been touched when Abby had presented him with adhesive coverings colored to match the shade of his hair.

It had been gesture that had saved him from a need to wear his black cap at all times, but in DiNozzo's view the damage runs deeper. After hearing this story, as far as DiNozzo is concerned, if McGee is indeed in his right mind then he is out of his mind.

x

"I think Special Agent McGee behaved in a very chivalrous manner," Michelle Lee declares from her own desk beyond McGee's.

"You would. Cearbhall was 'chivalrous', look what happened."

McGee looks at him blankly. He had said he remembers nothing, so none of them can be sure this is a good sign or a bad one.

"That's hardly the same type of chivalry," Lee insists. "Cearbhall wasn't a Knight, he was a Lord. They looked at things far differently."

"And you would know? _M__edieval_ doesn't even remember - or at least he says he doesn't. Me, I'm not so sure."

"Careful, Tony, memory is a tricky thing," Ziva cautions from across the bullpen. "I would not let him near too many swords if I were you."

"So says the woman who had me in a joint lock and tossed him a knife! 'Kill him'; you tell him. I've got a huge bruise in the center of my chest from that dagger."

"Could be worse," Ziva points out, "Cearbhall could have had Tim's knowledge of anatomy, as well as understanding of theatrical props."

"Sorry, Tony, I don't know _what _you're talking about," Tim maintains.

"All I'm saying is that I don't think you're cured, Probie-Wan, not if you have a naked woman in your bedroom pleading with you to do the wild thing and you sent her packing."

"And _I_ feel," Michelle insists, cutting off whatever McGee would say, "that if a man is committed to one woman he should behave properly – respectfully – to her, whether she is there or not."

"You telling me you don't think any man, confronted by a naked, willing and desperate woman, will not say 'yes'?"

"Obviously one does have the moral rectitude to refuse."

"What if it was your boyfriend? Think he'd say 'no'?"

"First off, Agent DiNozzo, he is not my _boyfriend_, he's my fiancé. But yes, I think – no, I _know_ – that he would have the moral rectitude to stay faithful to me no matter what."

"'Moral rectitude'," he scoffs dismissively, "I prefer another sort of rectitude."

Ziva slaps her desk explosively, comes out from behind it. "You are absolutely disgusting, you know that? And if anyone should–"

"Be disgusted on your own time, Ziva." Leroy Jethro Gibbs admonishes as he strides into the bullpen past her.

But as he reaches McGee he pauses, speaking quietly enough for only the man to hear, "I'm proud of you. That took a lot."

"Thanks, boss." He's surprised - Gibbs was nowhere near. How does he do this?

"Bringing it up in front of Ziva, not so smart - but it shows you've got it where it counts." He continues to his desk just as his telephone rings. The call is brief, the agents are alerted when they see his back stiffen. "Gear up," he orders as he hangs up the phone. "NCIS vehicle just went through the front of a Bridal Shop."

"When does an auto accident rate a call-out?" DiNozzo asks.

"Since she was already dead before she hit, shot through the back of the head. No ID."

This kicks the agents into high gear. They scoop up equipment, sort them out as they rush for the elevator.


	2. Marie

Chapter Two  
Marie

When Gibbs' blue Charger pulls into the parking lot, closely followed by the black, white and blue NCIS Crime Scene and Medical Examiner trucks, the area has already been cordoned off. Three Metro PD units form points of a huge triangle. Yellow 'Crime Scene' tape runs from them to secure a wide area from the adjacent Tuxedo and Circuit City stores to well into the parking lot. Nearly a hundred people press the limit of the yellow tape, some snapping pictures with their cell phones.

Such is the curious nature of the highly visible scene that crowd dispersal is a waste of effort. Restriction is the only reasonable option.

The large wedding boutique, center of attention, is distinguished by an impressive vertical crater in its center. The two trucks park behind him and effectively obscure the view from the highway.

There are nine women, employees and customers, outside the store, each separated by several feet and either being interviewed by a uniformed officer or awaiting their turn. It is not ideal to do this just yards from the added distractions of the growing crowd of gawkers, but the police try to make do with what they can.

Gibbs, David and Lee are grim as they disembark from his car. DiNozzo and McGee join them. No one speaks. One of their own is in that building, dead. This investigation will be thorough; justice swift and hopefully not too merciful.

The agents are met by a tall man wearing a blue suit, his sandy brown hair fluttering in the breeze. "I'm not going to say it again, LeeJay."

"I haven't recovered from the last time, Carp," Gibbs rejoins. The last time he had taken over a Crime Scene from the Homicide Detective Lieutenant, the man had greeted him with 'Lost another one to Nickis'. The jest had suffered a timely and unlamented demise. "What have you got?"

"I've got one of your cars and a ton of damage. No injuries - other than the driver. They tell you she's DOA?" Gibbs nods, having no taste for words. "No ID."

The words may be impersonal, the tone is not. Carpenter has known loss in his own ranks, he knows what these men and women feel.

"My people are taking statements, you'll get copies a-sap. The owner's down a few yards," he indicates where an angry woman stands outside the Tuxedo shop, talking loudly to a uniformed policewoman who apparently wants to be gone. "She's making a list of everyone she's going to sue and you're on the top of the list."

"Yeah, you know how much I care."

"I know." He pauses, capturing the attentions of the assembling agents. "You've got us with you on this one."

"Thanks, Carp." He lifts the yellow perimeter tape. The agents follow Carpenter into the debris field.

x

The rear two-thirds of the green car protrude from the far wall surrounded by the fragments of the checkout counter. The car had obliterated the plate glass window; several mannequins, three tables, a display stand, gowns, clothing and assorted detritus lie where they fell. All had been shattered and scattered by the impacts which climaxed in the obliteration of the rear counter and the punching through of the sheetrock wall. Everything up to the surprisingly intact windshield of the car is buried deep in an inner office. The six Investigators, together with Ducky and Jimmy, take in the devastation with varying degrees of quiet awe.

Gibbs' first focus is the car. He steps close enough to see what is left of the face of the red haired woman who had been driving it. A single glance is sufficient for a positive identification.

A mule kicks him in the stomach. He closes his eyes, wishing it were possible to unsee the woman.

He will not allow surprise, or any other emotion he feels, to show in his face. His private feelings are not for display to those under his command or the Investigator at his side. Now is the time to focus on the job, not on feelings.

Opening his eyes, he tries to block out the gaping hole that extends from hairline to nose. Blood flowed heavily in the first moment of death down her face and onto her blouse, sprayed on the windshield which is littered with worse. He tries to shut off feelings, shut out everything but work.

At some point the woman's head had fallen to the right but, restrained by the seatbelt harness, she has not slipped forward so her face is still visible without his having to touch her body. He had been wondering what he would feel when he saw her; now that he does there are too many emotions from which to choose.

"She's one of yours?" Carpenter asks sympathetically.

"Used to be," Gibbs answers, trying to keep his voice bland, guarded.

Carpenter clasps his hand on Gibbs shoulder, then moves off, letting the chief begin his investigation.

DiNozzo steps closer, looks in the window. There's not a lot of face to identify. "I don't recognize her."

"Marie Lassiter."

The name's not familiar either, no surprise. "Where was she posted?"

"Nowhere, DiNozzo," he says, making sure his voice doesn't carry to the surrounding Metro police. "She's my ex-wife."

x

Among the more interesting if outré elements of this situation, Gibbs reflects as he inspects the body over DiNozzo's surprised silence, is that she wears a black jacket identical to the one he and the rest of the team wear. It includes the gold replica of their shield emblazoned upon the left breast. The black and white NCIS cap in the foot well before her is also as authentic as the logo on the driver and passenger doors.

All are equally false.

There's a line of blood through the rear strap of the cap and a bloodied hole above it. The lower half of the bill is splattered with blood, she had evidently been wearing it and it appears to have remained on her head until being dislodged in the crash. Further reconstruction will determine that with greater accuracy.

For now his ex-wife is in the custody of the Medical Examiner. He stands a step off with DiNozzo, allowing Ducky and Jimmy room to work. DiNozzo has passed the word quietly through his team. They are not investigating a fellow agent's murder. The case has actually become more interesting.

He wishes he could be elsewhere.

x

Unwilling to share in the best of times, this is a moment that calls for the greatest of privacy. Ziva, not a respecter of privacy that affects the jib, steps closer. "That is really your wife?"

He doesn't look at the corpse. "She was."

"I am sorry."

Gibbs turns to her, is about to tell her not to waste her sympathy.

"_YOU_!" A strident voice cuts him off. It comes from the blousy woman climbing through the debris of what had once been the picture window. The middle-aged woman with too blonde hair and considerably too much make-up advances upon him like a tank. "You're in charge of this 'Naval Investigative' bunch?"

"Special Agent Gibbs," he introduces himself, showing her his badge and ID, both of which she waves away.

"Well, 'Special Agent Gibbs', just who is going to _pay _for all this damage? Look at this! There is a body _bleeding_ in my shop!"

"Oh, the dead don't bleed," Jimmy Palmer interjects helpfully from behind Ducky. The expression the woman turns on him is equal parts outrage and astonishment at being so rudely interrupted. Sadly Jimmy interprets this expression as an invitation to proceed. "You see, when the heart stops, blood stops flowing. There may have been a second or two after the bullet hit her for her heart to stop beating, but what you see is the result of spray from the initial shot, bearing in mind that the head does receive the primary flow of blood through the body. No, gravity will cause settling of the blood in the buttocks and feet, ankles and legs, what's called lividity, but –."

"Mr. Palmer." Ducky is leaning in to the window so his voice is neither loud nor firm, but it does attract the younger man's attention long enough for him to realize his explanation is not entirely welcome.

"Sorry, Doctor," he says, now self-conscious.

"Lee!" Gibbs' call is sharp. There is something too surreal about discussing any of this next to the car containing the corpse of his ex-wife.

"Sir?" The Asian woman responds crisply, having apparently magically appeared beside him.

"Take Ms..."

"DuPres and I've already given a statement."

"DuPres outside and take her statement." Gibbs concluded his order as though he'd never been interrupted, unfazed by the aggravated glare she turns on him. For a long moment the two lock eyes, but he's the champion of the 'hard stare'.

"Yes, sir. Madam?" Lee says with polite firmness, having recognized her job is less inquiry than babysitting. She will hold the woman out of Gibbs' hair, while trying to ease her rage, until he is ready to talk to her. Lee's job; have her ready to talk rather than to rant.

x

As the furious woman turns again to the street, determined to lead the charge and Michelle passes Jimmy, the Asian woman's hand comes up. Her fingers slap the back of the tall man's head, not forcefully but just enough to dislodge his black cap. Jimmy turns to her, astonished as Michelle looks back. The bright smile she favors him with is a hair's breadth shy of a smirk.

She follows the woman through the huge opening that had once been the display window. None of them will trust the integrity of the fractured glass door. A better choice is the danger they know.

She does her best not to let the irony of the day show in her too-expressive eyes. This is one of the shops she had considered consulting prior to their dramatic remodeling. She wonders if it will be restored in time to feature in her own plans.

"You've an interesting team, LeeJay," Carpenter observes.

"They get weirder all the time."

x

"Well, that's it," Carpenter concludes his interrupted conversation with Gibbs after the women have departed, feeling slightly sorry for the diminutive Asian. At the same time he gives officer MacKenzie a hard look as she stands by the fractured glass door. She'll have to explain to him how she'd allowed the woman to slip past her.

"We're out of here. I'll have our reports faxed over. I'm sure you'll want to collect your own statements."

"Thanks, Carp."

The Lieutenant pats Gibbs arm as he departs, never realizing how misdirected his sympathy is. "Saddle up," he orders generally, "we're outta here."

xx

Gibbs stands looking into the car at the nearly destroyed, all too familiar face, a face he remembers having loved so very long ago, one of so many lives ago. For a few moments he can remember her as she was, when things between them were good, until a flash of light snaps his attention behind him. He looks back, finding DiNozzo lowering his camera.

"I'm amazed they didn't catch on. NCIS never did use official green cars."

"You and I know that. Ever see all the colors Metro uses?"

"The logo looks good," he looks at the woman behind the wheel. He's been told her real identity, he still has trouble believing it.

Gibbs, not caring to express any thoughts, turns to his team. Something is missing. "McGee!"

The man turns from one of the broken tables. "Yes?"

He is annoyed to have to say it. "Bring in the _stuff_!"

x

As the others do their work, Ziva finds her attention drawn more and more to the heavily cracked front door. Gibbs had actually had to send Tim out to retrieve the materials they would need for their Investigation. It's an oversight that her lover had not brought them in the first place, one that she'd never expect of him. Gathering of supplies is a mutual duty but half the time Tony manages to duck it. She and Michelle had been with Gibbs, so normally McGee would have just brought in the satchel.

But she becomes aware he is gone for at least a minute to accomplish the task of 15 seconds. Mildly concerned, considering his earlier 'medical problems', she steps out to find Tim standing in the van.

"Having problems?" she asks, climbing into the van behind him. He jumps, startled, and turns to her.

"You're _not_ going to believe this," he assures her. He has half the drawers open, looking over their contents, "I'm drawing an blank - and I've done this a hundred times."

"Only a hundred?" Her smile is more of a smirk, but in it she tries to hide her concern. She, Tony and Lee have been watching him cautiously for several days, even while pretending they are not. They're watching for any hint of the reappearance of Greagoir Daibhidh Cearbhall. "How much sleep did you get last night?" With the story he told, she figures not much.

"I didn't," he admits.

"Frustrated?"

"Maybe," he grants.

"Maybe I should come tonight to protect you from intruders." She gives him a significant smile. "I can make certain you are not frustrated."

He smiles lewdly. "Like that."

"I shall escort you home. Make certain you are safe." Her eyes silently assure him he shall _not_ be completely safe.

"You think that really is Gibbs' ex-wife in there?"

That's odd. Not that he's changing the subject from their private plans - Tony or Michelle might come out - but that he would doubt Gibbs' word on such a thing as who he was married to. "He says it is."

"Well, I'll bet he's relieved." She looks her silent question. How could the murder of his wife - ex or no - make Gibbs relieved? "No more alimony."

She's more than appalled. The insensitivity of the remark sends a chill through her. "You should not let him hear you say that," she warns, reaches past him and grabs the strap of a large black bag. "We should get back inside before he decides to come out."

x

As soon as they return with the bag Gibbs, at the car with Tony, Ducky and Palmer, calls out; not even looking at them; "McGee, give me a sighting."

Tim halts, looking lost. It's an expression Ziva cannot help being concerned about. She turns to him. His blank expression slaps her face. He really has no idea what he's just been ordered to do. She glances back at Gibbs, he's already moved on.

She leans in close to McGee, whispers, "Assume the car kept to a straight line and align with the hole in the office wall out the front window." He bends slightly, looking at the small hole punched through the rear window of the car, lining it up with the hole in the windshield just beyond the woman's head.

Ziva, growing ever more concerned, tugs the black satchel out of his right hand, kneels down with it. A few moments later she pulls out and unzips a black case, removes a laser scope. She slaps it into McGee's hand and gives his leg a firm push toward the office door.

She stares at him as he crosses the room to the door, growing more worried by the moment. She looks to the other Agents; none of them have noticed and she offers a prayer of thanks that Gibbs' attention is on the woman in the car. She wonders how she can tell anyone of her fears without Tim losing his job.

It is all too clear to her that he has not recovered from his injury, despite her hopes and best efforts. He'd returned to the job too early, should have taken the Leave as she'd wanted him to. But when Gibbs had decided he'd be better off working than 'sitting around reading more Sword and Sorcery garbage', he'd been too damned stubborn to press it. And now maybe...

x

McGee enters the inner office, heads to the back wall and gets only halfway through the smaller room before the door behind him opens again. He glances back to see the outraged battleship of a woman who had unsuccessfully confronted Gibbs. She'd obviously seen him enter her office and broken away from her keeper.

"_You_! What are you doing and when are you going to get that car out of my shop?"

He glances at DuPres and at Michelle behind her, annoyed the girl had let her charge get away without putting her into restraints. "Using a laser scope. Later."

"I have a _business _to run! I have three appointments for fittings today–" He turns from her, giving his attention to the small hole in the wall before him.

"Good luck," he tells her. The outer room is shattered, she'll probably have her next appointment in a week. His dismissal only serves to increase the battleship's wrath.

"I'm supposed to be running a Bridal Shop, not a wreaked car dealership!"

He tries not to smile. "The sooner we can finish our work, the sooner we can get out of here," he tells her unsympathetically. There is more at stake than an insignificant shop, and if she cannot see that then he has no time for her. He has already spent thirty seconds being polite, now he is too busy.

He puts the scope up to the hole in the back wall. "If we're lucky, we can be done by sometime this evening."

"This _evening_?" she demands, outrage boiling over. Lee takes her arm, tries to escort her away so McGee can work but she stands her ground. "Have you any idea how much moneyI'm going to lose today?"

"Nope." He turns on the device and aligns its red beam with the hole in the front windshield of the car behind him.

She grabs his arm, making the beam go wild. "Listen to me, you–"

He looks back and her throat seizes as she sees death in the Agent's eyes. His growling voice doesn't carry more than a few inches but it's as cold as the grave. "Take your hand off me before I break it."

Ann DuPres very carefully releases him, taking a step back as McGee, his eyes hard as steel, returns to his work. It's difficult to say which of the women is more unnerved.

xxx

The Autopsy suite of NCIS Headquarters is a curious place, one no one wishes to come to but to which, it seems, everyone ultimately arrives to become brief guests of Doctor Donald "Ducky" Mallard and his Assistant Jimmy Palmer. The body of Marie nee Lassiter formerly Gibbs had been removed from the scene of her death considerably sooner than the Investigating Agents could depart. It has been stripped, prepared, weighed, measured, photographed and extensively x-rayed and now lies on the silver table between the two men. The External exam having been completed, Ducky makes the second of three major incisions in her body, the diagonal strokes descending from shoulders to meet low over the sternum.

Curiously, their latest guest has made the most spectacular arrival at her state that anyone has accomplished in a truly long time. Ducky has recorded on tape the results of the external and x-ray exams. The majority of the damage is from a very rapid acceleration followed by an equally sudden deceleration. Everything must be evaluated. The Cause of Death cannot legally be assumed to be the bullet that entered the back of Marie Lassiter's head to break through the front of her skull in a one and a quarter inch hole, caring brain matter and vital fluids with it. Ducky expects that will very likely be the essence of his final determination - when he determines that nothing about the crash contributed to her lamentable condition.

"Precision, Mr. Palmer, is always essential. We cannot assume the obvious as the Cause of Death unless we can prove it such."

"'Once we have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'."

Ducky looks up. "Yes, though I don't think the illustrious Mr. Holmes, or more accurately the even more illustrious Mr. Doyle, quite had a situation like this in mind when he established that ort-quoted credo. Tell me, my boy, why must we determine the exact Cause of the lady's demise?"

With Mallard everything is a test, even more so than being back in the classroom, and Jimmy would not have it any other way. "Because head shots are not always fatal, and if the crash killed her - or contributed to her death - then whoever shot her might be charged with Manslaughter rather than murder."

"Precisely, a legal splitting of hairs that, in my opinion, has led to too many cases of justice diminished or out-rightly denied."

"I think Agent Gibbs would go along with you, doctor."

"Yes, in this case particularly I think he would."

x

"I recall the incident," the Medical Examiner continues, "of Marine Sergeant Larry Fuentes, oh, years before your time. While parachuting from 13,000 feet his chute failed to open and he crashed through the roof of a parked car, quite astonishing a young couple in flagrante delicto - ohhh dear."

Jimmy looks into the woman's widely spread chest, seeing what had given the older man pause. "Oh, boy," he mutters.

"Marie," Ducky admonishes sadly, "Jethro is not going to like this..."

xx

"All right," Leroy Jethro Gibbs' voice cuts sharply through the bullpen and many of the cubicles beyond, "forgetting the fact that this is my former wife–"

"Like that's going to be easy," DiNozzo cuts in, grateful that he's several feet out of range, if one could actually be said to be 'out of range' of the former sniper.

Gibbs continues without a break, "what do we have, people?"

After their return to Headquarters an hour after the body had been removed, Gibbs had given them twenty minutes to compile data. He decides he has been too patient.

This is the time for all the various and widely divergent investigations to come together, to be assimilated into the 'big picture', as Tony would say while he's still out of range.

"We have," Tony begins grandly, abandoning his desk for center stage, "a civilian driving a green Chevy Blazer - nice car by the way, only 7,000 miles on it - through a plate glass window, assorted mannequins and displays and a checkout counter to end up four feet inside the shop owner's office. However, sometime before this dramatic entrance someone put a bullet through the back of her head."

"Two witnesses," Ziva takes up the narrative, "report a bullet punctured the glass and the sheetrock wall behind the counter 'an instant before the car smashed through'. Tim removed a foot square section of the building rear wall from which Abby retrieved a .308 caliber shell. It penetrated seven inches through sheetrock into the wooden beam beyond."

Tim turns to her. "Through three windows, her head, through a sheetrock wall and then seven inches into the next; that was a pretty powerful round."

"Ya think, McGee? It was a full metal jacket rifle bullet."

"How can you tell?" So far as McGee knows, Gibbs had not seen the recovered bullet. He had dug out the wall and put the entire section into a sealed evidence bag. He hadn't even seen the actual bullet.

This knowledge, coupled with the fact that Gibbs is a marksman sniper and the dead woman is his former wife, does not add up to a pleasant total for their boss.

Gibbs looks at him sharply. "You ask that after Kate?"

McGee stares at him blankly, never a good idea.

"Her head was also intact," DiNozzo elucidates for the Probie, not revealing his concern that he should have to explain so elementary a fact. "The exit wound was an inch and a half in diameter - actually a rather impressive preservation, considering. I haven't seen any that good in a while."

He raises his voice, resuming his report to the whole. "The car itself was never used by NCIS, I even checked undercover registries. The logo looks good, Abby's checking the paint."

"The owner, sir," Lee says, hating to have to give her report. Having been assigned a Probie's task, she has nothing as significant to contribute, "Ann DuPres, is looking for someone to sue, and is putting together a rather impressive list. But she actually has nothing at all to contribute to the investigation."

There. Her report, such as it is, is done, and she'd hated every word, for it as much summarizes her own situation.

She wonders if she should mention - later - McGee's threatening of a victim, and nearly scaring the hell out of her. Months ago she would have blurted it out, but experience has also taught her discretion.

Then, across the diagonal of the bullpen, she meets Ziva's eyes. McGee is trying his best to cope with a difficult time. He should be resting. He neither needs nor deserves the reprimand her unconsidered words would earn him. If DuPres doesn't mention the incident, they'll have ducked their own bullet and McGee can buy extra recovery time.

x

"The laser, assuming the car didn't get misaligned in the crash," McGee tells them, "shows the bullet was fired from the parking lot. Once Ducky's van was gone the laser had an uninterrupted trajectory. The building across the highway, assuming again that the shooter would fire across a highway, presents a blank face with no place to hide. He'd have to stand in the open with a rifle in his hands."

"Another car sitting in the lot?"

"The shot was horizontal, that's my guess."

"What do the surveillance tapes show?"

"Well, I - haven't run them yet." He realizes too late that this was a very bad thing to say.

"Why _not_, McGee?"

He decides the only thing he can do is suck it up and remind the man that "I just got back here."

"Has Ducky filed his report yet?"

DiNozzo, as Senior, decides it's up to him to remind the impatient man that "It's barely been a half hour, boss."

Gibbs pulls to a hard stop. To him, it's been hours too long.

x

"McGee, get on that infernal machine, find out what Marie Lassiter has been doing for the past 11 years." He had really not cared before this, she was to this point nothing more to him than a monthly drain on his checking account. For the umpteenth time he wishes he'd had a better lawyer; _he_ had divorced _her_.

"Why eleven years?" McGee inquires.

The question truly aggravates Gibbs. To this point he had been containing his feelings of grief and anger. Now they burst from him, the leading edge of an explosion a decade in the making.

"Because I _divorced_ her in '96; I _know_ what she was doing up to then, sleeping in another man's bed, which is why I didn't _care_ what she did after '96. _Now_ I want to know. Is that _too much_ to ask of you?"

"N - no, boss."

Gibbs returns to his desk, fuming. He had made a passion of keeping those under his command - and beside or over him for that matter - in the dark about his personal life. Now he's had to reveal far too much in an effort to find out why someone had put a bullet into his ex-wife's head and ostensibly done him a favor.

Not that this is something he dares express. People might take that thought and blow it entirely out of proportion.

Despite years of anger and frustration over a woman he had once loved, he had never considered doing what some unknown assailant had done. But now he must find out who and why, and ultimately bring that person to justice.

And in all that, there is one particular question he wants answered: W_hy _was she impersonating an NCIS Agent when she had been killed?

x

Unable to sit still any longer, he leaves the Squad Room, leaving behind some very relieved Agents, each of whom feels sorry for whoever it is that Gibbs is on his way to visit.


	3. Message in a 308

Chapter Three  
Message in a .308

Abby might say he feels the need for some 'centering', he wouldn't use such 'New Age' crap. Still, before going down to see the body of his ex-wife in Autopsy, Gibbs opts to visit the most off-center person he knows.

He pauses at the 'Caf-Pow!' machine. A little bribe never hurts, though she hardly needs a bribe to distract him from whatever bad mood he is in. She does that normally just by being her warp speed, off-the-walls self.

When he walks into her lab and the reinforced doors open, he's hit by a barrage of sound. The mélange of noise can hardly be described as music, and it always amazes him that she can appreciate it as such. Normally he doesn't mind her tastes - he either shuts it out or tells her to shut off the damn noise - but this time it's too much of an indulgence.

He reaches for the radio on the shelf but doesn't snap it off. Instead he changes the station to more tolerable notes - actual music - and lowers the volume to an endurable level.

Abby leaves her workstation with a huff of annoyance, crosses to the radio and tunes it back to her station. She raises it to a higher volume than before and stands with her hands planted firmly on her hips.

Unable to believe her audacity, he lowers the volume and turns it to an Easy Listening station. He thinks the rendition of Sonny and Cher's 'I Got You Babe' is more appropriate to an elevator than a Crime Lab, but anything is preferable to Abby's deluge of sound.

She turns the dial back to her station, a snap of her wrist raises the volume to maximum, the sound painful.

Gibbs explodes.

x

It's well she cannot hear what he's saying at his own respectable volume and purposely does not read his lips. For nearly thirty seconds he releases a vast amount of venom.

When he's done, she turns the radio off and smiles at him with infinite sweetness. "Feel better?"

"Yes, thanks."

"Ducky called to warn me you were going to be in a _very_ bad mood. I figured you needed an excuse to blow off some steam."

"I never need an excuse, but now I can at least face the day." He hands her the large 'Caf-Pow!' and she takes a mighty draught.

"Now so can _I_." She sets down the cup.

"What have you got, and why would Ducky warn you that I'll be in a bad mood?"

"You mean besides it being your ex-wife?" He doesn't answer. "I don't know, Gibbs, perhaps it has something to do with what he's found but I'll leave that for him to tell you because that's obviously going to be your next stop."

She's already riding her caffeine high the way a surfer rides a wave, ready to cram paragraphs into single breaths as she leads him to her workstation and directs an image onto the large plasma screen mounted on the wall.

"I'm afraid you're going to need to turn on the radio again, because I'm too virginal to hear what you're going to say."

He considers himself wise enough not to touch that point.

"I have for you one .308 Lapua Winchester 7.62, boat tail, full metal jacket, molybdenum-disulfide coated bullet." The description is too familiar to both of them. Two years ago that same type of bullet ended the life of Special Agent Caitlyn Todd.

"I had a feeling you were going to say that." Looking at the image of the barely dented, still distinctive bullet gives him no joy

"Sorry I couldn't disappoint you."

x

During his days as a Marine Corps Sniper in the late '80's and early 90's, he'd favored a very similar type of bullet. "It's okay, Abs," he tells her, thinking there can be no joy, "it goes well with Marie."

"I didn't think anything went well with Marie," she tells him sympathetically.

x

"What about the car?"

"What about the car?"

"The emblem on either side of the door, analysis of the paint –" He can barely believe he has to spell it out for the woman.

"_Gibbs_, Tony brought me the bullet and a slew of photos barely half an hour ago. They're gonna call me from downstairs when the car is towed into the garage and I'll go down and check it over."

He looks at his watch, surprised to find she's right, as well as frustrated to recall that DiNozzo had made the very same point. Though Mallard and Palmer had left early with the body, the team had been all morning in that shop. To him it had felt like the whole afternoon has gone by already.

Abby steps forward and pulls him into a hug. Though he'd never admit it, eventually reality is set right again.

xxx

"All right, Ducky, your turn," Gibbs announces as he strides into Autopsy, finding Mallard and Palmer exploring the open chest of a red haired woman he doesn't want to remember.

"I hadn't realized we were taking turns," Ducky replies, his voice slightly distorted by the clear plastic shield lowered before his face.

"Well, you are; Abby went first this time."

"Ladies first, always, Jethro," he admonishes. "Now what we have here–" one look into the exposed chest cavity of the woman is more than Gibbs wants or needs, "is a woman who smoked entirely too much in her lifetime. Notice that cancerous growths have already largely compromised her lungs, heart, liver, pancreas, stomach … well, suffice it to say that if she were still alive I would give her no more than three more months to stay that way."

"How long ago did this start?"

"Oh, normally I'd say certainly no less than two years ago to get this extensive damage. I cannot say when she started smoking, though I can give a minimum estimate, but this cancer is very far advanced and I would place that at two years. I have to have the MedLab run a biopsy, but the damage is extensive and must have been very painful."

"What was she doing for it?"

Ducky looks up, and Gibbs does not like the look in his eyes. "Why nothing, Jethro."

"_Nothing_?"

"That's why I gave my estimate under the qualifier 'normally'. Most people would take measures to cure this or try to drive it into remission. I can find no evidence of radioactive, chemical or surgical treatments to slow or hinder the spread of the cancer, which is why I prefer to have the MedLab double check my estimates. Most patients, if they've succumbed to the debilitating effects of this plague before crossing my path, will have done something about it and the cancer would not be so widely spread. In your late wife – pardon me, late ex-wife – nothing has been done to impede its progress, so my normal estimates could be faulty."

"Is it possible she didn't know?"

"Oh, I would say that is highly unlikely; the damage to her organs is so extensive the pain must have been excruciating. Abby can also confirm or refute the presence of pain medications within her system, but I would say that whoever shot this poor woman almost certainly did her a favor."

x

"Who did shoot her?" he muses, not really expecting an answer. "Whoever did it used the same type of ammunition I used as a Sniper, a .308 Lapua Winchester 7.62 by 51 Boat Tail, Hollow Point. I'm thinking whoever did it also used the same type of weapon I did, the same kind that bastard Ari Haswari used to kill Kate. But we need to find it to be certain."

Ducky understands what the man is saying; that right now he only has his gut instinct to work from. "Good Lord, you're thinking there's a message here?"

"Marie always loved to make an 'entrance'; usually the flashier the better. This time I think she put everything into her exit. She was wearing a mock-up of our uniform - Abby will tell us where it came from, it's not Government issue. She was driving a car which may have been her own - Lee's tracking that - through the window of a bridal shop; and not the one she used for our wedding. Someone shot her in the back of the head." He looks down into her open chest. It has been a very long time since he has 'seen' her heart. "It's a message, all right. I'm just not sure what it says."

x

Gibbs stares at the body on the table and Ducky asks him the question no one else would dare voice. "What did you feel when you discovered that it _was_ Marie?"

Gibbs looks at him grimly. "What, shall I tell you of the ultimate closure?"

"I'm not trying to tell you what you should–"

"Don't use your psychoanalysis on me, Duck, I don't want to play. It's murder. It's our job to find the answers, nothing more."

"Are you sure there's nothing more in this–"

"No, Ducky, I'm _not_ sure!" he snaps. "She impersonated an NCIS Agent, whoever shot her used almost the same bullet I used to in the Corps. You don't set this up for love," he stalks toward the stairs, needing the time the exertion will buy, "you set it up for _hate_."

xxx

Gibbs is no more than halfway to his desk when DiNozzo says, "The Director called, she wants to see you in her office immediately."

Gibbs closes his eyes for a moment and veers for the stairs. "DiNozzo, you're on lunch detail."

He is gone, the Agents breathing figurative sighs of relief. He'd brought a wash of tension into the bullpen and carries it away with him again.

xx

He just manages to stride halfway through the outer office when Cynthia's softened voice stops him. This time she doesn't leap up to block his path. Now her soft voice stops him better than any challenge from her ever had. "Special Agent Gibbs?"

He turns to her, she has his full attention for the first time in months. "Yes?"

"I just want to express my condolences about your wife."

He doesn't correct her; she is fully aware Marie is not his wife, but the thought cannot be dismissed. "Thank you."

"The Director's waiting for you."

"Thank you."

xx

She is not waiting for him at her desk when he enters; she is at the window looking over the view of the bay. "How bad was it, Jethro?" she asks, not turning around.

"Bad enough."

Crossing to the bar in the corner, she removes the stopper from a large decanter, pours half a glass of Bourbon and carries it to him. He takes the glass, she doesn't let go and for a long moment their eyes meet over the drink. "How bad was it?"

He takes the glass from her, turns and steps to the far side of the room. For a long moment the silence is long and painful. She can get to him more than anyone else can. She can almost make him admit feelings. He drains the glass in one gulp.

"It's one thing to be angry with her for years, to bury feelings after a time into writing a monthly check, but there was a time I _loved_ her. Mad as she made me, I didn't want her dead."

"I know." Leroy Jethro Gibbs would never let anyone beside herself and Ducky in. But she's seen into him through happy times and the fury that had followed betrayal. "That's what makes what I have to do now that much harder."

x

When he turns, already knowing what she's referring to, he sees the set of 8 by 11 papers in her hand. The pages are biound in the plastic folder with the full color round NCIS imprinted upon it.

"Do you know what this is?"

"I've a pretty good idea."

"Good, then I don't have to tell you." They are the Investigatory Regulations, the ones that say, among other things, that due to his personal relationship with the victim of the crime, he is prohibited from working this case. "You and your whole team are too close to this one. I shouldn't, but I'm going to leave the decision up to you. Should I give it to DiMarco or Joswig?"

He knows why she has selected those choices. Robert DiMarco is SSA of a team on Alpha Shift with Gibbs', an ex-Marine who would get the job done right for a Brother-in-Arms. Martine Joswig had been indoctrinated into NCIS by Gibbs when they both worked under Mike Franks. She had been his Probie before Jennifer had met him. Now, fourteen years later, Joswig is SSA of her own Beta Shift team. She and her people will get the answers needed just as quickly.

x

"Don't. I'm asking you. Don't."

"It's not my call. You know that as well as I do. I'm giving you the choice, but if you won't make it then I have to."

"Give me twenty four hours."

She lets her sigh tell him her frustration. Won't he ever listen? "I can't give you twenty four minutes."

"All right."

She doesn't trust it; this is too painless.

"DiNozzo. He takes point on this."

"Damn it, Jethro, it's one thing to play fast and loose with the regulations when you're right, but this time – "

"Twenty four hours, Jenny. Please."

"Anyone finds out, we'll both be working for Fornell – scrubbing the toilets in the Hoover Building."

"Please."

x

The moment stretches painfully; one of them has to give. "You haven't said 'please' to me in a long time."

"Been a long time since I've said it to anyone."

"I know." She returns to her desk, pulls open a drawer, drops the papers in and shuts it. "As your Director, I'll ask you this only once: Can you investigate this matter like you would any other?"

"Nope," she is surprised by the open admission, "Marie was my wife and I did love her - once. Can I do my job and bring in her killer? Yes. Will he or she be breathing when he or she gets here? That entirely depends on what he or she forces me to do to protect the lives of my team."

For a long moment Jennifer Shepherd looks deeply into the eyes of her old partner, considering. There are varying degrees of trust. She's never known him to be professionally untrustworthy or capricious. She's never doubted him or lost faith in his judgment. The laws are very specific about what she must do, her trust in him is very specific about what she will do.

"Very well; just …" she doesn't want to say this, but more than one career is on the line, "don't make me regret it."

xxx

A half hour after Tony returns to the office with several paper bags Ziva's computer 'pings'. She glances at it, finds a notice that she has new e-mail. When she opens it, it is a brief message: 'Follow me. D.'

She looks past the monitor, seeing DiNozzo leave the bullpen and go toward the elevator. Seeing McGee firmly attentive to his task she gets up and follows the man. He boards the elevator ahead of her all the way, presses the button for the main lobby. She's hardly surprised when, as soon as the car starts to descend, he throws the Emergency switch. The car halts and the lights dim, the blue emergency lights come up.

"You know," she says, "it occurs to me that it is fortunate this building needs two elevators; one for travel and one for conferences." But Tony does not rise to the bait. It is clear from his expression that he is not in a joking mood.

"Officer David, have you noticed McGyver lately?"

"All the time," she assures him, mildly surprised at both his formality and the question itself. Their relationship has hardly been a secret these many months. "Why?"

"Because he's not himself."

x

These words are enough to send her into High Alert. They'd just experienced, a few days ago, a horrible occasion of the man 'not being himself'. Each has been watchful of any indication of more abnormal behavior. She had been disturbed by what had happened in the shop, but she had hoped she had been the only one. She'd avoided mentioning Tim's lack of memory to Gibbs. Gibbs would have to tske action and whatever happened would be very bad for Tim. She'd keep his secret rather than risking that. But what had DiNozzo seen?

"What do you mean?" she asks quietly, trying to hold back her apprehension.

"Well, have you noticed that every time Gibbs leaves the room, and a couple of times when he hasn't, McGee's been searching his desk?"

"Searching...?" The word just doesn't seem to apply to the man - or to his desk.

"I know. He's got that thing laid out better than a library, just like his computer. I remember, three weeks ago, I asked him for a file and, without taking his eyes off the monitor or stopping his typing for an instant, he pulled open his drawer, ran his fingers two thirds back along those perfectly neat rows of his, pulled the file and handed it to me. Now it's like he's lost, can't find anything without searching for it.

"Then there's that story this morning; don't you find that a little odd? He has a naked woman break into his apartment and –" he sees the fire in her eyes. "All right, we've been through that; how about this? Have you noticed he's been out of sorts? Tense?"

x

She thinks back to the incident in the van. She has to tell him. Suppose it's a symptom of worse and because he wasn't on alert and she was distracted something went wrong?

"I have noticed he has been forgetful. A few times it is like he will forget what he is doing and I will have to remind him. He could not find the Evidence bag in the van this morning. It was two feet away from him."

"Well, this is more than forgetful: what did Gibbs order him to do?"

"Track down information on Marie Lassiter over the past eleven years."

"Right. What do you think he's _been _doing?"

She does not want to guess. If he has not been diligently following that order...

"I passed behind his desk a half hour ago on my way back from lunch detail. I was talking to Byrne in Accounting, we separated at his office so rather than going all the way to the elevator I took the stairs down and came along this floor – save ten steps, I know. McGee's got his code log open and is keying codes into another program."

"Which one?"

"I couldn't see, he had the window reduced to just the input bar, but I could just _feel_ the tension rolling off him. I continued around, came up to his desk, and as we're talking - he was put out that we _were_ talking, by the way - I leaned over and guess what I found."

"His code log and a mysterious access bar?"

"No, he was looking at Marie Lassiter's Driver's Registration from a month after she and Gibbs got divorced."

Ziva checks her watch. That would have been an early step. "Do you mean that for the past-?"

"If Gibbs finds out he's going to go ape." Ziva reaches for the Emergency switch, but he grasps her wrist. "Don't bother. I passed behind his desk a few minutes ago and found something even more interesting."

"What?"

"He dug up one of those old privacy screens; probably kept it in his desk, you know how anal-retentive he can be. He put it over his monitor."

x

Nearly three years ago, prior to her joining NCIS, then-Director Morrow had ordered filters to be installed over all monitors so the screens could only be read when looking straight on, to prevent sensitive information from being compromised. They were an aggravation more than an aid because they did their jobs so well not even the operator could use them comfortably, and conferences threatened to become a thing of the past. They had lasted less than a week before Gibbs had finally made the man see reason. He, DiNozzo and Todd had promptly dumped theirs into the 'rectangular files'. She is not surprised McGee had stuck his into a drawer.

"What are you going to do?"

"Do? I'm taking up the investigation, tracking Lassiter in addition to my own assignment - and I suggest you do the same. This way, whatever little sojourn McGeek is on now won't get him strung up by his throat when Gibbs calls for his report, which might be any second now. We keep the Probette out of this."

"Agreed." Gibbs' Rule #4 goes: 'Best way to keep a secret; keep it to yourself. The second best is to tell one other person if you must. There is no third best.'

"But after this is over you, McGecko and I are coming back in here for a serious talk."

He reaches for the switch, but this time she stops him. "Tony ... thank you."

"Hey, what are partners for?"

xxx

"The jacket's bogus," Abby declares definitely, looking up from her microscope to Gibbs as he stands beside her workstation, "and so is the hat. Not only are they from the wrong companies, the stitching is wrong too. Embroidery, like so many other things, is distinctive, and the stitching on our caps is all produced by the same program.

"Every hat contains the same number of stitches, the same type and color thread, the same width of the stitches. Presuming the hats themselves to be identical, there should be no way to distinguish one from another."

"What, she had it done somewhere?"

"Hardly a long stretch, Gibbs. I could buy a black cap anyplace, walk into an embroidery shop and have them stitch 'NCIS' on it if I cared to spend the money for something I get for free. The work on the jacket is just as good, a commercial job where the shield is silk-screened, probably from a computer picture."

"Where did she get it done?"

"There are nine shops in Washington that do custom embroidery _and_ silk screening, not counting the one we actually use, so I'm afraid you and the others will just have to pound the pavement. The good news is that whoever did it will likely remember it. There can't be too much demand for 'Federal Agent' jackets. The good news is there's not a drop of dried sweat on the band. I'd say she never wore the cap or jacket until today, so I doubt it was done long ago."

"Good work, Abby."

"I aim to please."

"What did you find _on_ the jacket and hat?"

"Fibers; some are nylon, others cotton and synthetic. I'm still running comparisons. I found hair in the hat, none old, which supported my sweat theory." She grins at him, not getting him to rise to the bait.

"One person's?"

"Sorry, Gibbs, you didn't get lucky. It looks like it was just her."

x

The ascending elevator stops on the main floor and admits SSA Robert DiMarco, one of his counterparts on Alpha Shift. Headquarters boasts 12 teams located in bullpens throughout the building, DiMarco leads one of the best. Second best is his own opinion, but he's certain that DiMarco shares that same opinion, only in reverse.

"How you doin', Leroy?"

"Okay - busy as hell but that's nothing new."

"I heard about your wife, I just wanted to say -."

"Don't worry about it. That's ex-wife; we split a long time ago and I broke with her even earlier. Thanks for the thought, but she's just another case." He can tell the man does not believe him. He doesn't care. "How're things with you?"

"We're going after Kenming this afternoon, it couldn't have been anyone else." Jacob Kenming is responsible for paying pensions to retired Naval personnel. It seems that the pensions of several retired sailors, most of whom live alone, under care or otherwise unable to notice the drain, have been receiving a one quarter percent loss of their pay.

Individually it was not significant, collectively it amounts to a respectable monthly income for Kenming. He might have gotten away with it indefinitely except that the particularly diligent son of a WW2 veteran had noticed the discrepancy in the unchanging allocation which could not be accounted for, had become suspicious and notified NCIS.

The meticulous investigation had lasted three weeks and had ruled out everyone except for one man who was living considerably better than his rating.

"Good job."

"Legwork. Seems that's one thing about this job that never changes," the doors open on four, Gibbs hadn't pushed three, now he gets off with DiMarco. "These young pups we have these days think the computer's the best thing since Cherrios. I don't know, don't get me wrong, my people are the best, bar none - but you and I remember the old NIS and sometimes I long for those days."

"Progress," Gibbs admits. "Can't hold back the clock, no matter what we'd like."

"Still, it's not the same," DiMarco's voice lowers. "Between you and me, I'm thinking of putting in my papers."

x

Gibbs restrains himself from answering. Despite the number of years he has been in, nearly twenty five, DiMarco is not yet at mandatory retirement age. Also, if he doesn't know he is a 'finalist' for Deputy Director, Gibbs knows it's not his place to tell him. He'd hate to see the man go - not only because of his valuable experience but because DiMarco, like Gibbs, is an old time Marine and understands just what that means. That is one reason Shepherd had offered to have DiMarco spearhead Gibbs' investigation.

x

"I've been around long enough to go through three full Teams, and sometimes I wonder if there is much more for me here. Not much higher an old war horse like me can go without playing politics and Government Service doesn't make one rich - at least not if you play according to Hoyle."

This sounds unusually cynical, and also settles the question. He doesn't know. Then again, Shepherd may have already made her decision - which would then be Martine Joswig - and is waiting for the opportune moment to announce it. The position would be temporary in Washington anyway; whoever is selected will replace the retiring Tom Court as Special Agent-in-Charge of the Northeast Division come New Year's.

Gibbs had been quite busy lately, and was never one for politics anyway, but he's glad he always makes discretion his tutor. "Well, whatever you decide; make sure you're sure. Mexico was nice, but in the end it's better to be here, making a difference."

"I hear you. Then again, who knows what could happen? My ship could come in."

"Who knows?"

xx

When Gibbs returns to the bullpen on three he reflects on the very few but best conversations he can have are with other SSA's like DiMarco, Joswig, Higgins and the others, equals he can let his hair down with - figuratively at least - and discuss things he cannot with his Team. He would hate to see DiMarco become so disillusioned or discouraged that he makes good on his prediction. But then again, the one thing in NCIS that never changes is that things always change.

xxx

Throughout lunch Ziva had not been relaxed, having been hard pressed all day to keep from glancing at McGee every other second. She knows that behavior was certain to tip him off. She'd had lunch, though it cannot be said she had tasted it. Upon finishing and throwing away the bag Ziva is struck by the realization that she has no idea what she had just eaten.

As gets up, heads for the elevator, not intending to go anywhere other than away from her desk. She rides down, just letting the relative silence clear her mind. The car stops below ground and Jimmy Palmer gets on.

He is mildly surprised when she doesn't get off but presses the button for Abby's lab level. But when the doors again open, neither of them get off. The doors close again and, unsummoned, the car remains where it is. "Ziva, could I talk to you?"

She's surprised out of her reverie by the intense question and turns to the taller man. Waves of tension wash over her. They buffet her so intensely she's amazed she'd missed it. Too much famikiarity in NCIS - is she losing her edge?, "What is wrong?"

"It's Michelle. That - I mean - that is - she's - she's fine, but–"

Ziva's upheld hands stop his rush. "Easy, Jimmy, I can understand you a lot better if you would just take a moment." The man always seemed to be trying to cram an entire conversation into one sentence, frequently tripping over his own tongue as a result.

While it makes an interesting counterpoint to the far more loquacious Ducky, and Michelle might possibly find it endearing, Ziva has a much easier time with him when he can confine single thoughts to individual sentences.

"All right, but …" he looks around; visibly trying to organize his thoughts. "I know … that is, Michelle told me - you've been working on her - working _with_ her I mean."

x

She decides it'll go more smoothly if she just gets the details covered succinctly. "I have been teaching her some of the defense methods we use in Mossad, if that is what you mean. She is well trained on your American techniques, and once she got over her nervousness she could even handle a knife better than she did before." She wonders if Jimmy knows about the day she had been trying to teach DiNozzo, McGee and Lee how to use throwing knives and the young Agent had nearly skewered Gibbs. "I have high hopes for her."

"I pushed her," Jimmy admits something that'd been no sscret to Ziva as Michelle's partner, "to get back to being a Field Agent after she was bumped into Legal, wanting to try to get her career back on track and now … and now …."

"And now?"

"I'm scared."

That Ziva can tell very well.

"I've been having second thoughts, like maybe Gibbs was right. I'm scared for her. She was hurt a couple of times, she's been in the hospital twice - and someone nearly _shot _her while she was guarding Abby. Then she gets beaten up, nearly gets her neck broken and then strangled and–"

Ziva raises her hands again. He stops and after a few moments can continue more calmly.

"I wake up from nightmares sometimes," he tells her more cautiously. "A _lot_ of times. Lately I'm scared to _death_ that someday she'll wind up on my table."

"That is a real possibility," Ziva admits as quietly. "Ours is a dangerous life. You could well spend a portion of your life patching her back together after missions. You are fortunate in that becoming a Medical Examiner means you must first be a doctor of the living. You will need those skills before your time together is over.

"Any one or more of us can die tomorrow; or even today, who knows? You knew Kate Todd, I never did. One instant she is alive, the next there's a hole through the middle of her brain. Look what happened to Paula Cassidy's team when they took our place for a weekend rotation, and then to Paula herself. You and Ducky had to put them back together." She sees the effect that recollection has on him. None of them want those memories.

"I lost my sixteen-year-old sister to a Hamas suicide bomber. What I never told anyone here is that I was a block away when the bomb detonated, and she had been one of nine people killed. I had to assemble the pieces of my sister out on the street. Is this lung Tali's? Does this piece of thigh belong to Tali or to someone else? That is an open wound I carry today."

x

She watches the image take hold, building his anxieties. "But there is _also_ the chance she will outlive you, or that you will have a long and happy life together and expire in your 90's from doing something you do entirely too much of in your twenties." Her expressive smile allows no ambiguity.

"Michelle is resourceful. She growing as an Agent. I have sparred with her and I think she can handle herself. She has good combat skills, just needs more training."

"But I've been _worried_ about her," he insists. "So worried I've been thinking of asking her to–"

"Go back to Legal?" He nods. "That is between the two of you. You are going to be her husband, not mine, but frankly I think it is a _stupid _move."

"Huh?" He hadn't expected so definite a conclusion.

"Lee worked hard for years to get where she is. She was on track to be a Field Agent before she ever met you. She has the potential to be a good Agent. I have seen things that make me think she has it in her to one day be a Team Leader." In the Mossad she had seen all kinds and is confident she can tell which ones will make it, which ones don't have it - and which ones will surprise you.

"Huh?" he asks again. He is surprised but pleased, and a little proud as well.

"Give her ten years, if she sticks at it, yes; I can see her in charge of a Team. Now you can ask her to reconsider, to change course; but I think you will be incredibly _stupid_ to try it. You are setting yourself up for an argument you will never win.

"If she refuses, as I think she might, and you push her too hard you may lose her completely and may never get her back, at least not in the way she is to you now. And if she complies, gives up her career for the sake of family harmony because you are afraid of what _might_ happen, she will resent you for the rest of her life and whatever your relationship loses in the prospect you will probably never get back.

"So before you press her into something, you had better be _sure _what it is you really want to lose."

"You don't pull any punches, do you?"

"If you want pulled punches you should have gone to Mother O'Mallory. She will be sweet and kind and understanding and helpful. I am giving it to you 'like a man' because I think you can take it as a man. Marriage is about support and love. If you cannot face the joys _and_ the risks of the future, then you have no business thinking about getting married."


	4. Blazer

Chapter Four  
Blazer

"Boss, you're going to want to see this," DiNozzo calls Gibbs' attention as the Supervisor approaches the bullpen, following his talk with Shepherd. Before Gibbs can enter the area, DiNozzo stands up and announces: "Campfire!"

The other Agents, with varying degrees of reluctance, step out to join him at the large plasma screen. DiNozzo picks up the remote and activates the device. Upon it appears a picture of asphalt with a black smudge cutting across it. "What we see here, ladies and gentlemen of the bullpen, is a fresh tire mark found one hundred four feet away from the Bridal shop and on the direct line used by Marie Lassiter's car. Note, please, the unusual nature of the mark."

The dark rubber ground into the cement starts off thick and heavy on the right and tapers off quickly to the left, but the extent of that thickness is wrong. "The car was moving already." Gibbs concludes.

"Bingo, mon fearless leader," Tony agrees, his tone then turning pedantic. "You see, Probie and Probettes, that if the car were stationary and then went from zero to sixty in five seconds flat, there would be far more rubber at the starting point. But no, the car was already moving and then she hit the accelerator."

"When she was shot," Ziva concludes.

"Not quite, there's no certainty she'd floor it when she was shot. The body might convulse at the moment of death and the car take off like at bat out of hell - or coast to a halt. More likely she floored, then got cacked."

Gibbs is about to respond to the cack when McGee cuts him off.

"Could she have been trying to escape from someone?"

"Possible."

"Then it wasn't a plot and she wasn't in on it."

DiNozzo's hand comes up fast and slaps the back of McGee's head. An instant later DiNozzo is doubled over, his expelled breath ending in a pained wheeze, the back of McGee's right fist in his abdomen. As startled as the Agents are, McGee is equally surprised. "Tony, I'm _sorry_," he exclaims, grasping the man's shoulders to steady him, "I wasn't thinking - it was reflex."

Tony makes his way back very carefully to his desk. "Good reflexes," he wheezes, easing himself into his chair. He knew the man was seeing a Personal Trainer in the gym twice a week since becoming a famous writer, but had hardly thought this was part of the training.

He also determines to test that training sometime when they're alone.

x

"Now that the sandbox set is done mixing it up," Gibbs grabs their attention sharply back to the plasma screen, even while determining to be more alert to McGee's reflexes in the future, "the shooter had to be directly behind Marie, in another car. The shot was almost perfectly horizontal and came from a high powered rifle. DiNozzo, pull the surveillance tapes from the Mall Security cameras and see what you can find. McGee, I'm still waiting on that history. Ziva, pull all of Marie's medical records, everything you can find on cancer, who her doctor was, when she last saw him and why. Lee, pull her bank records, track her buying; credit cards, checks, the works. And while you're all at it, find out where she got that uniform." He continues on to his desk.

DiNozzo looks to the standing Agents, considering McGee lucky that Gibbs is remaining in the bullpen. "Campfire over," he groans.

x

Picking up his phone, Gibbs pushes the intercom button for the Forensics Lab; a moment later hearing: "This is station NCIS, you're on the air with the fabulous Abby Sciuto. Next caller please."

"Abby,"

"Hello, mystery caller, what is your name and where are you from?"

"You _know _my name," he tells her sharply, "and if I have to come down there you're not going to like–"

"Sorry, mystery caller, there are no visits to the set. Anyway I won't be here, the garage called and Marie Lassiter's car is being delivered even as we speak."

Gibbs slams the phone down and leaves his desk. As soon as he boards the elevator, DiNozzo turns to McGee.

"What the hell was that stupid sucker-punch?" he hisses.

"I said I was sorry," Tim reminds him contritely. "It was just reflex."

"Reflex my eye. You do that again–"

"You should have thought before you 'Gibbs-slapped' him." Ziva points out, her tone conveying an even deeper message to her partner. No hits to the back of his head, not while they're trying to figure out if a hit to his head is still causing the odd behavior they've been seeing.

"Well, anyway, back to work, people," DiNozzo advises, not allowing anyone to read his understanding of the message he'd received, but in 'backing down' there is hardly a way to avoid it. "Gibbs didn't look happy and when he comes back he's going to want to see some hard results - or we're _all_ going to get slapped."

"Speak for yourself," Lee mutters.

xx

When Gibbs strides into the garage Abby, wearing a bright orange coverall, turns to him, clipboard in her hand, "Gibbs, do not ask me for a report. I got here thirty seconds ago."

"I wasn't going to ask you for a report thirty seconds in," he assures her.

"Thank you." She turns back to the car, examining the front of it.

He checks his watch, "It's forty five, what have you got?"

She shakes her head, admitting defeat. "I've _got_ a 2006 Chevy Blazer, front end slightly scratched but that'll happen when you go through a sheet rock wall at who knows how many miles per hour - I'll know soon and I'll tell you. One person inside, two holes in the windows and a load of spray forward and back. Much of it was caught under the bill of the cap, otherwise there would be more on the glass than the dashboard. Give me an hour and I'll tell you more."

xx

Gibbs gives her that hour but he does it from within the garage, making his own inspection and watching every move she makes as she goes over the vehicle. Inch by inch, above, within and below, she checks off things on the clipboard in her hand and makes notes. Finally, at the end of the hour, she sets the clipboard down beside him. He snatches it up and scans what she's written.

The paper contains nothing more than checkmarks to the left of the components of the car and collections of small black Braille dots to the right of each line. He looks up at her. "You think this is funny?"

"Well, I wasn't looking for a belly-laugh, I was kind of going for a wry chuckle." She recognizes she's not going to get it, turns and leads him back to the car. "The fingerprint analysis will take a while, I'll call you when I have something, but in general I found plenty of prints up front, both driver side and passenger, not so many in back. The wheel has been adjusted for someone I'd say was roughly five foot nine. I'll make my calculations and get back to you on that too, but I see no indication that the height has been adjusted anytime recently. Ditto for the seat; there's a good collection of dust on the mechanism.

"The headrest is all the way down, for someone meeting my estimate of five nine," she pauses until she gets his nod, "the bullet cleared it with an inch and a half to spare, and the bill of her cap caught a lot of the spray," she points forward, "so there is a discernable line - or rather curve – in the intensity of the spray on the window." She turns full-on to him.

"The bullet we discussed already. It went through her head, three panes of glass, a sheet rock dividing wall and seven inches into the rear wall of the shop. I'll be able to tell you soon how far she was from the shop when she was hit -,"

"Around one hundred four feet. That's if she convulsed, stomped down on the gas, I'm checking with Ducky how likely that is."

She acknowledges the information with a nod, hardly surprised to receive it. "Probably pretty likely if she was already moving. She might have had up to three seconds on the gas, and then inertia took her the rest of the way. She went up the curb, through the shop but had only enough momentum to carry her half way through the inner wall. The bullet beat her by a few seconds and had enough to carry all the way in and bury itself in the rear wall."

"Most of the length of the lot to build up momentum and then a final burst of speed near the end?"

"Now, how much of this didn't you know before you got here?"

He turns, walking away, "the fingerprints."

"Gibbs?" She manages to make him stop, to turn back to her. "We're gonna get whoever it was. I swear." He leaves, and she wonders if any of that made him feel better.

x

Alone in the elevator, Gibbs flicks the Emergency Stop switch, needing a moment to think. He's pressing his team hard, harder than usual, and he can't deny that much of the reason is personal. Marie Lassiter had, for many years, been a source of aggravation and frustration, but before that she had been his wife and he had loved her. Now she rests in one of Ducky's coolers, having been found wearing replicas of NCIS uniform attire and driving what is possibly a passing copy of an NCIS car; or would be if the model, color, design, paint, logo and specific accoutrements had been correct. In other words, as DiNozzo would say, it was a 'bogus knockoff'.

This is a mystery unlike any he had been asked to solve for the NCIS. It would not even be in NCIS jurisdiction: a _former_ Marine wife. The only reason for unquestioned jurisdiction is that it is a Pretender-Agent driving a car designed to give only one impression, but a pretender nonetheless. It shouldn't be his case, he'd pushed the rules beyond the point where they'd snapped, and if there's any shrapnel involved Jenny will be cut by it. This would be Metro Homicide's baby except for that, and now he is not going to listen to anyone who would tell him to give it up.

He looks at his watch. It's barely two in the afternoon and he considers he has one of two choices: he can go back up to the bullpen and crack the whip some more, or he can step back and let his people do their jobs.

The realization of the time helps him to make another decision. He had received this case before breakfast and had been driving himself and his people all day. It's time for lunch and then, possibly, a brisk walk to clear his head.

First, however, there's something he wants to check. Starting the elevator again, pressing the button for the cafeteria level, he pulls out his cell phone and keys a speed dial combination. It's a long shot, perhaps too long, but: "DiNozzo, there's something I want you to look into for me…"

x

In the bullpen Ziva, noticing DiNozzo take a call and immediately leave his desk for the elevator, continues to divide her attention between her assigned duty and concern for the man seated across from her. She must wonder how she can solve each of the problems. As she watches McGee work intently, his eyes never leaving the filtered screen before him, she can feel the waves of tension flowing from him. She doesn't know why he's so tense, so driven. Whatever the reason, it is, as DiNozzo has said, very 'un-McGee-like'.

Tim has always been the one to let the pressures of the day seem to slide off him. Ever since the incident with Cearbhall, however, she has been watching him for any signs of change or odd behavior. In the past day she has been rewarded with a plethora of abnormalities. But how to combat them; that is the question.

She watches him gradually become more and more frustrated, tension and anger mounting until they increase hers. She can stand it no longer. Whatever is going on, she has been patient long enough.

x

Typing a short Instant Message, she transmits it to his monitor. When she hears the 'ping' of her message's arrival she gets up, walks slowly out of the bullpen and heads toward the elevator. She does not have to look back to know he is following, leaving Lee alone to carry on her work.

When the elevator opens they get in, she doesn't say a word. This elevator, frequently used for conferences to the point that the alternate elevator in the back has become the one of choice for most Agents in the building, is still not a good place for the conversation she has in mind. For this, there is only one place that will do.

They ride upward to the top floor and their private 'retreat' through the fire door at the end of the long corridor. Her mind is on their private sanctuary, but she feels the tension continue to radiate from him. This time, however, there is something more in his eyes as he looks at her. It is obvious that he anticipates a more pleasant encounter in their retreat than she does. Let him.

She gets off the elevator, turns left, leaves him content to follow down the long corridor. She pushes open the broken Emergency door and steps into the right corner of the dimly lit stairwell.

When the door closes behind him and he approaches, she holds up her hand. Now is not the time for fun. "Tim, I want to talk to you."

"And here I thought," he says suavely, putting his hands on her hips, "that you were in the mood for something else."

His smile is almost a leer, and she doesn't find it attractive, especially now. "No. I really do want to talk to you."

His hands slip from her hips, around her waist and then he draws her close to him, holding her pressed intimately to him. "You could have talked anywhere else."

"Tim, will you be serious?"

"I am." His lips on hers are normally so warm and pleasant, now they are not. She doesn't want to be distracted, but as he shifts his kiss to her throat in an effort to stimulate her, and presses his hands to her back, driving her unencumbered breasts to his chest, she knows he will not listen to her.

"Why is it– Ohhh!" She pushes him far enough away that she can see him. What his lips were doing to her, what sensations in her breasts, and elsewhere, his body makes her feel, if she doesn't stop him she won't be able to talk. "Why is it that American men, faced with a woman alone in a dark place, have only one thing they can think of?"

"I wouldn't know, Ziva, I thought I was Irish."

She sighs with deep exasperation when he pulls her back, embracing her more firmly. In fact, as he backs her against the wall and she feels him pressing against her, firmness is definitely an issue. But it's her firmness, not his, that she needs. "Tim, would you _please_–"

His right hand comes back around between them and he tugs hard at her black shirt, pulls it from her skirt and slips into the space, reaches up to her bare breast. "Tim, could you just once, for two minutes–" His hand caresses her breasts as his other holds her closer and his lips at her throat are doing terrible things to her own concentration.

He traps her closer to the wall, his other hand pulling the back of her skirt up. "All _right_!" she gives in. "Maybe if I let you get it off your chest you will be ready to listen to me!"

"It's not getting it off my chest that I have in mind," he mutters against her throat, grabbing her shirt in both hands and pulling up. He only breaks the kiss to pull the material over her head and off her arms. He looks at her bare chest with a hunger she has not seen in his eyes in weeks.

"All right. Satisfied?"

"No."

He embraces her again, pulling her chest to his and her sigh is more exasperation than lust. Maybe if she gives in to him, when he is done he can make some sense. Feeling nothing of her usual pleasure at his touch, his kisses and his lust, she allows him to touch her.

One hand on her breast, the other snaking up under her skirt, his lips on hers, she feels nothing but frustration. She turns away, breaking the kiss, though his lips immediately attack her throat, trying again to stimulate her.

The sensations, familiar though they are and normally so pleasant, do nothing for her now. "Tim, could you just – ahhh!" Despite how good his lips on her throat is making her body feel, his right hand on her breast is too rough. "_Whoa_, a little easier," she admonishes.

Tim pulls her bare body closer to him, his lips now on hers again as he holds her tightly, kisses her with deep, almost brutal passion. She pulls her head back, breaking free from his lips. "Not so hard! You are usually–"

He smothers her words with his kiss, but it is too hard. His force almost bruises her lips against her teeth. His left arm holds her tightly against him while his right hand closes firmly over her breast– too firmly. "_Easy_!" She breaks the kiss, turns away. His grip is too tight. "Will you not be so rough?" He grabs a handful of her hair, holds her still for his kiss, forces his tongue into her mouth.

She pushes against him but he's holding her too tightly. She doesn't want to break away in earnest, doesn't want to hurt him, but this is not as much fun as it usually is. She turns aside despite his grip in her hair and pulls back so she can see him. "Come on, easy, damn it - you do not have to hurt me!"

His hands reach under her skirt, grab her thong panties. He pulls hard and she hears the thong snap as it comes loose from her hips. "_Tim_! Those are _15_ pant–!" The fragments flutter to her ankles as he clutches her tightly against him. Ziva grows angry now as his right hand comes up roughly between her legs. His mouth comes down and closes on her left nipple. "Take it easy, will you? You are never– Be _gentle_ down there!" She winces at his touch, far from the gentle fondling and stroking she's used to from him. She's about to call an end to this, regardless of his feelings, or his safety, if he 'fouls' one more time.

"Come on, Tim, lighten up, you are being _too_ rough! Ease up, will you?" He sucks hard on her sensitive breast and she tenses apprehensively, "Tim, come on, remember, no teeth on the– _OWWWW_!" She slams her hands into his body, drives him away, restrains a scream as his teeth come off her nipple.

"_Enough_! That is _it_! _No more_!" She covers her sore breast, fury overwhelming everything as she sees the imprint of his teeth in her nipple. "We are _done_! If you cannot play _nice_ then you can play with your own left hand!"

Tugging her tee shirt back on, she abandons her ruined panties upon the landing and stalks out the door. She no longer cares to talk to him, no longer wants to see him, just prays he will be _stupid_ enough to follow!

xx

Descending from the top floor in the elevator, seething and sore, Ziva is surprised when the car stops on five and DiNozzo boards. "What are you doing here?" The words come out sharper than she'd intended and she tries to rein in her anger.

"Excuse _me_, Ziva, but Gibbs sent me up to check on something with the Archives - an Agent impersonation case Gibbs, Blackadder and I worked five years back."

"What was that?" She'll focus on the ancient case; anything to distract her from the anger and the pain in her nipple.

"A guy bought these copies of our hats and jackets on-line. He turned out to be nothing more than a seventeen-year-old wannabe out to impress the chicklets. Got four months for Impersonating. Last word is he has a job in West Virginia, nothing more in his record. Gibbs wanted to check if the place he got them from could be where Marie got hers. It was an E-bay store I'm gonna check out. Now, what are _you _doing here?"

She backs off, emotionally if not physically. The incident with Tim is enough of a distress. To be with DiNozzo in the confining space of the elevator without her panties is just icing on the cake of her misery. She resists the urge to cover her sore nipple. "I am sorry. I am having a really bad day."

"Tell me about it."

"No, Tony, I will _not_ tell you about–" She stops at his upraised hands.

"It's an expression, Ziva, one which two days ago you knew."

x

She slaps the Emergency Stop switch before the car reaches the third floor, but stands for several seconds in the dimmed lighting before she trusts herself to speak. The pain in her breast is sharp, though that in her heart is more poignant. "You have noticed that Tim is behaving oddly?"

DiNozzo could give half a dozen smart answers to such a straight line. Seeing the look in her eyes, he abandons them all, settling for reminding the woman of their previous conversation. "Doing his work behind a privacy screen, doing work Gibbs has not assigned and ignoring work he has, threatening a witness–. Oh, yes, Lee hasn't told you that one, I suggest you ask her. Yeah, you could say I've noticed."

"What do you think?" She does not know what to think. Normally Tim is so gentle, so considerate - now he was almost brutal. It had not been so much even a rough encounter – they had had their share of 'rough sex'. This felt more like the buildup to a rape.

"I think Cearbhall is back for a return engagement," Tony answers her question, not knowing about her mental soliloquy, "and that Gibbs was wrong in pushing him back to work and McGiggle was wrong in not resisting. He should have taken time off and gotten help." Tony restrains a sigh, not wanting his frustration to show. "He _says_ he doesn't remember anything. Me? I think that's so much crap. I think he does remember, because if he doesn't then he can't fight whatever's going on."

"What do we tell Gibbs?" She is not going to reveal her own … concerns.

"You mean that he was wrong, that he shouldn't have pushed McGee back, that the guy needs time off?" Tony thinks about this very hard. "This is going to come back and bite us on the ass no matter which way we play it. If we tell Gibbs and McGee has to go out on Psych Leave, he can't come back without an examination and today I have my doubts about his passing it. If we say nothing, hope it goes away and it gets worse..." he leaves it hanging, feeling he hardly has to draw a picture of the dilemma.

"What if you talk to him?"

The thought is not appealing. "Ziva, I don't do the intimate talk thing, I'm more the frat kind of guy. 'Hey, McGee, you having any hallucinations where you think you're seeing Elves again?' You think that's me?" Ziva shakes her head. "Why don't you talk to him?"

She reaches out, throws the silver switch and the car's lights come on full. The car resumes its decent and opens on the Operations level. "For the moment, we are not talking." She has no intention of explaining why. It is a very good idea for Tim McGee to keep his distance – at least until her breast stops hurting. And the vulnerable feeling she has standing here in front of Tony sans panties because of–.

x

Tony is about to get off, but she takes his arm, holds him back as she presses the button for the lobby. The doors close again and they start to descend. "Cover for me, will you, while I go to into the city for a little while?"

DiNozzo cannot believe this request: one does not just stroll off while on duty. "Where are you going?" he asks as the elevator doors open.

"Shopping."

xx

McGee returns to the Squad Room, having been obliged to take the stairs, the elevator not responding to his calls, and he finds only Michelle Lee present, working at the desk next to his. He yanks out his chair, trying to rein in his continuing anger and quite unable to do so. He sits down and immediately begins typing.

"Excuse me, Special Agent McGee sir, I–"

"What do you want Lee I'm very busy," he says tonelessly, not looking away from the screen.

"Sir, I was hoping you could help me with my computer. I keep getting memory allocation fault messages and–"

"Can't you handle it yourself Lee I don't have the time right now."

Michelle stares at him, speechless. She can no more believe his abrupt rudeness than she can his unwillingness to help her with a computer problem. Normally he is the soul of helpfulness - especially when it comes to computers - and even Greagoir Daibhidh Cearbhall had been more courteous. "Yes, sir, Special Agent McGee sir," she says softly.

xxx

Gibbs, finishing his break, stops first in Autopsy and finds Ducky and Palmer seated by the older man's desk, conversing in quiet tones. He doesn't know what private conversation he's interrupting and doesn't care. "Ducky, what did you learn?"

"Quite a bit, actually," the smaller man admits, rising and leading the Investigator to the lighted display boards. Upon them are illuminated several skull x-rays, taken from numerous angles.

It is time to switch tracks from consideration of a friend's future wife to another friend's past one.

"Your former wife," he indicates a spot on one of the sheets, an image of the rear of her head, then a left profile, "was shot from behind, as we all know. The bullet penetrated the occipital bone, pushed her head forward with the impact so that the bullet 'ascended' to exit through her forehead just below her hairline. Death would have been instantaneous."

"Could she have had a seizure at that moment?"

Ducky pauses, considers the likelihood. "Possibly, though it would have been brief. The bullet pierced the brain stem, that part of the brain responsible for autonomic functions such as respiration, heartbeat, temperature regulation, motor control. Death would be instantaneous but there _is_ the possibility the brain sent out one last burst in the form of a general contraction. It would be almost like an epileptic spasm, but this would not have been maintained for more than a second."

"Long enough for her to floor the gas pedal if she were already moving?"

"Possibly."

x

"What did the Biolab turn up on the cancer?"

"No joy, I'm afraid. There is no indication she ever took any steps to combat the spread of the disease. I find no evidence of chemotherapy, radiation, surgery - there simply is not anything at all one would expect a reasonable person to try."

"How long did she have it?"

"We estimate the first signs probably started nearly three years ago, gradually spread, the spreading increasing in speed as more organs were compromised. And no; there would have been no way that she would not be aware that something was wrong. The pain in the final months would have been enormous. Any rational person, even if unaware it is cancer, would have sought medical treatment for the pain, shortness of breath, excessive coughing - need I go on?"

"No, Duck, that's more than enough."

xxx

When Gibbs returns to the Squad Room DiNozzo, seeing him approaching, calls to him. "Boss, you're going to like this." He points the remote control toward the plasma screen, the image of a parking lot crowded with cars appearing upon it.

For the moment nothing is distinguishable beyond that crowd, but as the five Agents gather about the screen DiNozzo uses the control to enlarge the image, concentrating on the left side of the screen, each successive enlargement focusing more upon the left side of the lot.

By the third enlargement they can see a green Chevy Blazer heading down the lane between the rows of parked cars toward the mall. It is slightly blurred due to its high speed, but they can see the image of their own circular emblem painted on the driver's side door. Inside the car, they can make out a red haired head bent forward, the body held up by the shoulder strap of the restraining belt.

"And if you like that, you're gonna love this!"

The image shifts in stages upward on the screen, moving to the highway side of the lot, until it comes to a black Ford Mustang parked in the 'T' lane parallel to the road at the outer edge of the lot. The car is even more out of focus as DiNozzo enlarges it again and again, but they know the image can be sharpened. For now, all the detail they need to see is in the two feet of rifle barrel extending out the driver's window.


	5. First Day Probies?

Chapter Five  
First Day Probies?

"McGee, clean up that image," Gibbs directs, sending the man back to his desk, "DiNozzo, as soon as he has a picture, track down the owner of that car. Lee, what about Mar– Lassiter's bank records?"

"Sir, your wife–" she breaks off at his glare, "your ex-wife, I'm sorry sir, has for the past two years been making steady deposits that do not coincide with her salary as a Receptionist / Secretary for 'Allen, DuBrais and Schwartz; Esquires', nor from your scheduled Alimony payments. You always pay on the first of the month, your checks usually clear about the sixth to the ei –" she looks up in time to see his look and her voice diminishes, "but then you already know that."

"Then tell me what I don't know, Lee." He wonders if she will try to do it in one breath. Sometimes intensity can be straining.

"There is no particular pattern I can find in value or time on these other deposits. They range anywhere from a hundred to three hundred dollars, often irregular sums, and cash withdrawals from savings seem to be almost all ATM transactions, twenties through eighties. In general, her account shows a steady increase in balances over the past two years."

'Yep, one breath,' Gibbs thinks.

"Think she found herself a 'sugar-daddy'?" DiNozzo speculates, making himself the target for Gibbs' next glare, "not that that's necessarily a bad thing, I was just thinking–" He thinks it's a good idea to start over.

"A trace of her records shows she gave up her apartment six months ago, just walked away from the lease. Her legal residence is now a Post Office box in Brightwood; she has all her mail forwarded from her old address to this box. The forwarding order expires at the end of this month and hasn't been renewed."

Gibbs turns his attention back to the plasma screen, expecting to see an almost crystal clear image and finding the still barely discernable car displayed. "McGee, I _told_ you to clear up that picture."

"Sorry, having a little trouble with the program."

"What the hell is the matter, McGee?" he demands, exasperated, crossing the space between the desks. "This is the second computer problem you've had when I asked you for a report. You're practically a computer yourself." He leans across the desk but can see nothing and yanks the security filter away from the screen, "What the hell are you doing with this on anyway?" he slaps it onto the desk.

"Sir," Lee cuts in, "in all fairness, I've been having computer problems all day too. I think it might be a virus, sir"

"You _think_ ?" he demands, glaring back at her, then to his computer expert who had not alerted him to this problem nor had he solved it, and when he sees McGee's screen he feels his blood pressure peak. "Your photo thingy would work better if you had it _open_!" He reaches out, slaps the back of McGee's head.

Instantly McGee slams his arm away and is on his feet, face red in sudden fury. The two men glare at each other, McGee ready to fight, his fists clenched tightly as he stares at Gibbs. DiNozzo, David and Lee watch apprehensively as the men stand motionless in silent contest.

x

"Go home," Gibbs commands in a quiet, carefully constrained voice. "Don't come back until you straighten yourself out." For many long moments the confrontation continues, neither man backing down an inch. "I'm not telling you again," Gibbs warns.

McGee breaks, snatches his jacket from the hanger behind him and yanks it on as he stalks to the elevator, trailing a wake of rage.

When the elevator takes him away Gibbs turns to his remaining team. "Anybody have an idea what that was all about?"

"Cearbhall," DiNozzo answers promptly.

"_What_?"

"We don't think - that is _I_ don't think - that he's cured of whatever he went through." There had been a time when DiNozzo would have done more than share the blame, he'd have deflected all of it onto others. Having been a Team Leader for four months has cured him of that. "He came back too soon. I think you brought him back too soon. He's been acting strangely all day."

"And you didn't report it?"

"No, sir."

"How _long_ has this been going on without your reporting it?" He can barely believe that, focused on Marie Lassiter though he was, he could have missed it.

"Today."

He looks expectantly at Ziva, the one person who would notice if a button was undone. "He has been tense," she admits, barely able to meet his eyes. "Irritable, forgetful–"

"Forgetful?" the man's brain is practically hard wired, but days ago he had forgotten his entire life.

"- out of sorts, impatient, distracted–"

"I _get _the picture, Ziva." He focuses on Michelle, his glare forcing her to admit that:

"He threatened a victim, sir,"

Gibbs is incredulous. "Threatened a–"

"Ann DuPris, sir, the owner of 'A Touch of Elegance' Bridal Sal–"

"I know who she is, Lee!"

"Yes, sir. Well, she grabbed his arm, sir, and he ..." she swallows hard, ashamed not to have brought it to his attention, "he threatened to rip off her hand. Sir."

x

Gibbs steps away from McGee's desk, not allowing himself to get any closer to the three. "I can't believe I'm hearing this," he admits, then turns on them, his voice booms through the huge room. "_Are you three First Day Probies_?"

He reins himself in his. He had not shouted but Agents at the far end of the room had jumped at his explosive demand. "All right, 'Teamwork 101': when something like this happens, you do _not_ cover for your partner! You bring it to _my _attention and _I_ decide what to do about it. Understand?"

"Yes, sir," they respond in ragged chorus.

"Then get back to work," he heads for his own desk, "while I try to figure out what to do about this mess."

xx

Twenty five minutes later his intercom beeps. He picks up his phone and acknowledges with characteristic brevity. Ten seconds later he sets the receiver down and leaves his desk, noting the time on the clock on the far wall. "Wrap it up and go home," he orders generally, then pauses at Ziva's desk. "See him. Straighten him out. I want him back at his desk, ready to work, at 0800."

"Yes, sir," she answers quietly. He is already gone before she's finished.

xx

"What have you got for me, Abby? And before you say anything, know I'm in a really bad mood."

"Then I'm not sure how you're going to like this," she admits, pointing to her plasma screen. On it are two identical images of the circular NCIS logo, their badge in full color red, white, blue and gold surmounted by a brown and white bald eagle, surrounded by the words 'United States' and 'Naval Criminal Investigative Service', all enclosed within a gold cable tow. "The right one's the real thing, the left is off her driver side door. Now watch." She turns a control and the two images merge, but by no means exactly.

"Rather than using an adhered decal, someone painted this. The passenger door has the same effect and both doors differ from each other. These are freehand paintings from templates. The artist is good, but no one does the exact same picture twice. I'd love to have him do one, I give him or her a 97 on the driver's side, 94 on the passenger.

"Speaking of passenger," she continues, "she's been having one pretty steadily. I found two sets of fingerprints, hers on the driver side, another person's on the passenger and from what I can tell they all belong to the same person. Lots of them overlap or are beside themselves, separated only by time. I'm running the prints through IAFIS as we speak," she indicates the flashing images on the machine, which scans the records of the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System at a speed possible only for a computer. "The minute I get a hit, I'll call you."

"Are they male or female?"

She shakes her head, wishing she had a firm and definite answer that was impossible to be wrong on. "Come on, Gibbs, you know how it is; Ducky never draws conclusions before breakfast, and I won't do it before dinner. Size, contrary to popular belief, really doesn't matter. A man's prints are not always bigger than a woman's. They're not always definitive."

xxx

Jennifer Shepherd closes the outer door to her office and, carrying the bulging file folders in her left arm, she walks past MTAC toward the elevator. Night has long ago fallen, for her it's not an unusual departure time. But, looking down into the dark Squad Room, she's not surprised to find a solitary lamp lit down there. Crossing to the stairs, she descends and approaches the silent man. "Aren't you ever going to go home?"

Gibbs, broken out of his reverie, looks up at her. "That your homework?" he asks pointedly, showing the very small difference between them.

"Has to be," she admits with a sigh, fingering the folders, the thinnest of which is an inch thick, the largest topping out at three. "There aren't enough hours in the day for it. I just finished debriefing Martine Joswig on the Harrison UA – his C.O. has decided on Court Martial. I'm meeting with SAA Sam Moldananto at 09:00. The Abraham Lincoln and its group are coming into Norfolk day after tomorrow and we're going over the Security records. Even a home port has its share of risks for so many Sailors from all over the country. At 11:00 I'm going over some Personnel records with Mother O'Mallory." She notices his sour expression. He'd never been in favor of the woman's selection as Chaplain. Fortunately the decision had never been in his hands. "There's an issue brewing on Marino's team and sometimes it's good to get an 'informed outsider's' viewpoint before making a decision.

"After that, my day really starts to get busy."

"Make you nostalgic for those late-night stakeouts?"

She smiles, admitting that "Some of them had their moments." But lest they dwell too much on shared pleasures: "How goes it with your case?"

He leans back tiredly, "Which one?"

x

This surprises her. She knows of only one case, unless he's referring to the clandestine, ongoing investigation of the Swiss Accounts from the Carson / PDC-9 case.

Gibbs' eyes on hers are particularly piercing.

"Did I bring McGee back too soon?"

The question, coming without preamble, leaves her even more uncertain. "What do you mean?"

"I pushed him back to duty, even though he asked for time off. I believed that work was better for getting his brain back in order. It was better than sitting around playing on-line games that were probably the cause of the problem in the first place. Was I wrong?"

"Were _we_ wrong, Jethro," she stresses. "You recommended, I decided. Are you trying to tell me it was the wrong decision?"

He rubs his eyes tiredly, "I don't know."

"Well then, what does your gut tell you?"

He thinks about it, wondering why his gut has been giving him two contradictory answers all evening. "I'll give it another day. If he can't pull his weight, I'll come see you."

x

Jennifer says nothing more, just wishes him a good night and resumes her journey home. When she'd made her decision on the management of this case, she had committed both their fates to his judgment on the whole, not to particular parts. She'd known how he was going to orchestrate the Investigation when he'd placed DiNozzo in nominal charge. She'd never had any illusions on that, though she had not confronted the Senior Field Agent to learn just what deal – if any – they had made.

If DiNozzo doesn't know he's in charge, she doesn't want to know. If she knows, then the Director of NCIS has to know and that woman can be a bitch when someone does an end run around her.

She'd put her trust in her old partner and doesn't want to change her mind. Sometimes directing people is best managed by letting them do their jobs and trusting them - on every level.

xxx

Jimmy Palmer carefully draws his arm out from under the sleeping woman on his bed beside him, doing his best not to wake her. The heavy drapes that cover every window in the apartment leave everything in a cave-like darkness, but he hardly needs to see to find his way in so familiar territory. Unlike his fiancé's bedroom with its three touch lamp, his night table lamp beside his bed brings up the full 100 watts at once; very impolite when he has company.

Reaching for his glasses on the night table, where he had placed them far from the dangers of earthquake or worse, he gets off the bed, going from the bedroom through the living room into his kitchen. Opening the refrigerator provides the only light in the apartment, but his hand barely touches the container of milk when a bloodcurdling shriek splits the air!

Slamming the door shut, Jimmy runs through the familiar rooms, not needing any light until he slaps the switch next to the bedroom door, flooding the room in light and illuminating the gasping woman upon his bed.

She looks about wildly, half-blinded, her bare body heaving with the force of her breaths. But she is alone and does not appear hurt.

"'Chelle, what's wrong?"

"I – I – I had a nightmare!"

"No _kidding_." He sits down on the side of the bed, not wanting to sound too glib. She reaches for him, clutches his body as though it were her only security. "What was it?"

She doesn't want to remember it, wishing she could put it behind her. "It was weird, nonsense. Forget it."

"What was it?" She had certainly shown him the value of talking out nightmares; she'd helped him through so many of his.

His tone tells her he remembers his debt and intends to pay it. "I – I was in the Squad Room, at my desk. Agent McGee was at his desk next to mine. The others were gone. We each stood up to bring our reports to Gibbs' desk - we actually bumped into each other. He glared at me and said, really nasty, 'You're in my way.' 'I'm sorry, Special Agent McGee' I told him. He _shoved_ me back and said 'You're not getting in my way again' and he pulled out his gun and _shot_ me!"

"_McGee _shot you?"

"Right between the _eyes_! I could even watch the bullet coming." She's grateful when he puts his arm about her, draws her close into his protection. "What could it mean?"

"Don't bump into him."

x

She glares up at him. This is less than she'd hoped for, even though she is well aware he hasn't studied dream interpretation as she has. "Thanks." She's still shaken; the incident had been so real.

"I'm sorry," he tells her, gathering her close in his arms, "it just seems a little too unlikely."

That is what she had tried to tell him when she'd tried to avoid discussing the dream. She determines, even as she reaches for him, his touch her security, not to let this dream go. It was too real, it has to mean something. She just can't imagine what.

She decides she will bring it up to Kendra Little.

Kendra, her lawyer and, more usefully, her mentor and the High Priestess of Rising Star Coven, will have an answer.

xxx

Ziva David sits in Tim McGee's quiet apartment and glares again at the clock with mounting frustration. As soon as she had gotten off duty she had followed Gibbs' orders and had come here, finding from the street that his lights are on and coming up to his door. Gibbs had ordered him to return home, so that was what she had expected him to do. However, no matter how many times she rang the bell, or knocked, or called, or pounded on the door, the answer was always the same. Nothing.

Finally she decided she'd spent enough time being reasonable and that he could reasonably be declared to be in deadly danger, so she was justified in picking his lock. Doing so had revealed a galling truth - she had spent nearly five minutes pounding on the door of an empty though fully lighted apartment. Everything's in order, bed made though slightly rumpled, computer off and cold, the jacket he'd worn today not on the wall hook. He had apparently not come home yet.

She'd tried his cell phone to no avail, receiving only his voice mail. Though her initial messages had been filled with concern and affection, subsequent ones were steadily terser until they began to edge into anger.

She considered calling Abby and asking her to run the tracking program for that little tracer that the scientist had attached to his earlobe some time ago. She had actually begun keying in Abby's number before she snapped the cell phone closed. To call the woman would require bringing her in on what was happening, and quite probably establish a trail of evidence that might well work against Tim. She could not do that to him; not yet.

Feeling foolish, frustrated and steadily cultivating mad, she'd sat down at his computer station and did her best to try to figure out just where he could have gone. He had no appointment listed on his calendar. She accessed his e-mail and found nothing useful. She had decided she was not about to start randomly calling his friends.

Now, after two frustrating and useless hours, she hopes the answer to all this is that he _is_ losing his mind - because when he does walk in she's more than ready to give him several pieces of hers.


	6. Reignforest

Chapter Six  
Reignforest

The morning begins for Gibbs as too many do, buckets of questions and a driblet of answers. He considers it a good sign, however, when the elevator bell rings and a few seconds later Tim McGee comes around the corner of the bullpen and directly to him, his manner contrite.

"Boss, before you say anything I just want to apologize for what happened yesterday. I don't know what came over me but I was out of line and I'm sorry and it won't ever happen again."

No matter how many times Gibbs has advised him on the subject of apologies, he recognizes that this one, done in public, took a great deal and he's not going to embarrass the man further. "Take your station, Mr. McGee."

Maybe now it's time that they can get some work done.

x

Ziva glares at the oblivious Agent who never looks at her despite the fact that he should feel the twin lasers of her eyes boring into his head. She'd fallen asleep on his bed after one in the morning - he never had returned home. Somewhere, however, he had found a shower and change of clothes.

If that someplace had been Sciuto's – or _O'Mallory's _– someone is going to suffer!

x

She yanks the thought back sharply, realizing that is carrying betrayal too far.

Abby would never be able to hide it; she would give herself away in the first five minutes had Tim spent the night with her. O'Mallory? Aside from the fact that the woman lives in the Church Rectory, she has far too much to lose.

O'Mallory makes an art of discretion, and the Priest had already told her how careful she must be at all times in guarding against even the appearance of indiscretion. Ziva knew she never allowed McGee into her apartment – when she'd had an apartment – without a third person present. He had, therefore, been there only twice, once with many of the woman's congregation at an Open House, the other time when dropping Abby off for protection duty.

In O'Mallory's public life, there were too many people who were inclined feel that a less-than-perfect Priest was, by definition, the worst kind of sinner, and to follow the adage 'Guilty until proven innocent'.

So, eliminating the two least likely places, where had Tim spent the night?

x

"DiNozzo," Gibbs turns to the Senior Field Agent, finding him not alone; "and Abby; what have you got?"

"The Tony and Abby Show has," but then he stops, signals to Abby who strains on her mark. "Why don't you take it?"

"Thanks, Tony," she sets herself up and announces: "We _have_ a suspect!"

It is there that she stops, all five Agents looking at her.

"Are you going to make me come over there and drag it out of you?" Gibbs asks.

"No, Gibbs, I was just building suspense."

"_ABBY_!"

"I guess I have enough suspense." But then she grins triumphantly. "The IAFIS report came back at almost the same time as the registration of the car in the parking lot." DiNozzo touches a control and on the plasma screen appears the Driver's License of a white man of 36 years. "Patrick Reignforest, 2862 Taylor, in Brookland," she announces.

"He works in a retail store, also in Brookland," DiNozzo reports. "Sells outerwear during the winter, lighter in the summer."

Brookland is where the Post Office box that all of Marie Lassiter's mail is being forwarded to is located. "Gear up! Lee–"

"Search warrant for the gun," the woman anticipates; cell phone already in hand. She will call her former colleagues upstairs while they're on the move.

"In the fax bin before we get there." He refers to the courthouse. They'll use the Affedavit, get a judge's signature on the warrant and continue to Brookland.

As the team prepares shields, guns and all other necessary equipment, Gibbs amends the order. "Not you, McGee. Gou stay here and start building an airtight case. I want every connection between this Reignforest and Marie found and on my desk when we get back."

xxx

The day will come, Tony DiNozzo is sure, when he will figure out if Gibbs' driving warps the laws of normal physics or completely bends them pretzel-like and tosses them into a wastebasket. Were he to plan the trek from the courthouse halfway up to the Northeast corner of Washington in morning heavy traffic, he would give it an estimated 40 minutes of reasonable driving. Gibbs backstreet route gets them there in 16.

He is also to the door of the twenty story apartment building before Tony is out of the front seat.

When the younger man clears the car door, he hears a groan from behind him. He turns to see Lee drag herself out of the car, supporting herself on the door. "Ohhh," she tries to support her head, "I think I'm going to be airsick."

"You mean 'carsick'," he corrects with a measure of sympathy.

"Not the way Special Agent Gibbs drives."

"You'll get over it," he assures her as she looks up at him hopefully; "it only took me three years."

"Ohhhhh."

"Look on the bright side," he advises her, glancing at Ziva who is taking her place beside Gibbs, "you've never been in the back seat when Ziva drives."

"Shoot me now - _please_."

"_HEY_!" Gibbs' bark cuts through them. "Today!"

"On your six, boss!"

"Six feet under," Lee mutters, staggering after him.

xx

Apartment 18C is, from the corridor, just another vaguely anonymous apartment, 3rd of 4 surrounding a large central landing, distinguished only as being the residence of a suspected murderer. The Agents divide into two teams and Gibbs is about to announce them, preparatory to kicking the door down, when he reconsiders. "DiNozzo, take point."

Nothing more needs to pass between them. They have each known cases where arrests were contaminated by the presence and actions of persons who have a personal stake in the case and should not be present. This is what Gibbs had wanted to avoid in the incident with the late Paula Cassidy and he has no intention of introducing the same complications himself. DiNozzo, David and Lee will go in first; he'll guard the door and the integrity of the case.

DiNozzo's voice booms through the wide landing. "Federal Agents! Open Up, Reignforest!" A moment later he steps out and kicks the door, which flies open with a spray of splintering wood.

A tall man, wearing a white tee shirt and black pants, is halfway off the couch to their right when three Sigs are aimed at him - one to his head and two to his body.

He decides to surrender.

x

"Patrick Reignforest?" DiNozzo first wants to be certain he has the right suspect. His similarity to the photo formerly on the screen at Headquarters is good, but nothing beats a positive admission of identity when kicking down a door and arresting someone for murder.

"Yeah – who're you and why'd you bust my door down?"

"NCIS." He displays his IDs. The women continue displaying their guns. "You're under arrest on suspicion of murder."

"I didn't murder anyone!"

"Do you know a Marie Lassiter?" Reignforest does not reply. "Well?"

"I'm not saying anything without a Lawyer."

"That's probably a good idea," DiNozzo approves. He has known too many cases to fail due to improper procedure and he owes it to his friend out in the hall to make certain this goes down right.

Reaching under the back of his jacket, he pulls from his belt a set of handcuffs. "Patrick Reignforest, you are under arrest on suspicion of the murder of Marie Lassiter. Anything you say can and will be used against you..."

xx

Gibbs is galled beyond all words he would use in the presence of Michelle and Ziva - but he had known the bitter necessity of covering the hall while DiNozzo took point in the arrest, just as he has to in the interrogation to come. No matter how much self-control Gibbs believes he has, even if he does not get driven to outrage in the presence of his former love's murderer, his mere presence could be construed to have compromised the case.

Now, however, having called for a team of Agents who transport their suspect to NCIS Headquarters, the team begins a meticulous search of Reignforest's apartment. It is small; a bedroom, living room, kitchen and bath laid out in four square and it doesn't take more than a few moments to determine he does not - or did not - live alone.

Lee's search of the clothing in the bedroom turns up a plentitude of woman's clothing. The kitchen reveals extensive evidence of a 'woman's touch' down to cutesy magnets holding notes attached to the refrigerator, and a significant number of women's magazines in the rack in the bathroom. These last are all addressed to the subscriber: Marie Lassiter.

"This is worthless," Gibbs declares at the conclusion of the First Level Search, to be continued by the Forensics Team. "All this says is that Marie lived here. I want the gun with his fingerprints on it."

xxx

The return to Headquarters presents Gibbs with satisfying news and a surprise; the satisfaction coming from the report that Patrick Reignforest is safely secured in the locked Interrogation One, where Gibbs intends he will sit - and wait - beyond reasonable tolerance. The surprise comes in leading the Team into the Squad Room and finding McGee at _his_ desk.

"You trying for my job too, Elf – McGee?" Ever since the incident with Cearbhall, Gibbs is determined not to address the man as 'Elf Lord' ever again.

For a moment McGee looks up at him, his guilty explanation momentarily reduced to a blank stare. It takes a moment for him to find his voice, "Sorry, boss, I was having so many problems getting data out of my computer that I just gave up and figured yours would be better." With the mouse he closes the program he had been using.

Gibbs will not fault him. He wants answers and does not particularly care where they come from. "What did you find?"

"Marie Lassiter apparently moved in with Reignforest six months ago, but he did not change the lease. Landlord's been pissed over what he claimed was an illegal sub-let ever since and has tried to put him out. They've been in and out of L/T Court for almost half a year. As a result, Marie Lassiter has no official address other than the P.O. Box. Mail, credit cards, bills, everything goes there."

"Anything on a rifle for either of them?"

"Not yet."

"That's our top priority. Chances are, no matter who bought it, Reignforest disposed of it. He'd be a fool to keep it with him. Find it."


	7. Nightmare

Chapter Seven  
Nightmare

At 10:00 Reverend Siobhan O'Mallory leaves the Rectory of St. Mary the Virgin Church through the connecting back door leading to the church offices. She steps down the short hallway past the Sacristy on her left, intending to turn right into the office she shares with Rev. George Donaldson but she stops.

Donaldson is in the Confessional Booth on the Epistle side of the Church from 10:00 to 11:00 and there's no one in the office or preparation areas. She enters the Vesting Room on her left instead and inspects her appearance in the full length mirror. She has an appointment in less than an hour with her 'other boss', NCIS Director Jennifer Shepherd.

She's wearing her last Summer Uniform of skirt, short sleeved light blue shirt and white collar rather than secular attire. This is the only formal shirt she has left - it had been at the dry cleaners when her apartment had been blown up. There are more on order, due this week, but they had had to be fitted and haven't arrived. She had tried one of Donaldson's black square necks and had decided she would wear it only if she had to.

This light blue with wrap-around collar has been dry-cleaned within an inch of its life, but she has an image to maintain. When she goes out in public while performing her Clerical role, be it Church Curate or NCIS Chaplain, she does so in her proper attire.

x

Crossing the hall, she enters the office and goes to her desk, finding three pieces of mail upon it. Taking the first letter, she sits down, mindful of the time. She has just enough to skim through the pieces before she must leave. The new Church Secretary opens any mail addressed to St. Mary's, leaving mail addressed directly to either Priest upon their desks. The first two are routine letters; quick glances over them prove they are not urgent. She can deal with them when she returns.

The third envelope is from the Diocesan office of Washington's Bishop at the National Cathedral and this never rates a simple skim. Opening the envelope, she withdraws the papers, unfolds them and her heart seizes in her chest.

She drops the papers, stares at them in blind panic, a cold sweat breaking upon her. It's worse than the panic attacks she has been plagued with since the bombing of her home - this time she has a _reason_ to be frightened!

Her pounding heart races so fast she begins to feel dizzy and sick and her breath fragments in ragged gasps. She feels the brutal cold flood of fear surge through her body. It's carried on her racing blood, unreasoning panic stealing thought in the cold wash of terror.

These are not from the Bishop.

x

Though the top paper is official Diocesan stationary, the content of this and the other two pages is definitely not ordinary.

There are only a few printed words over the first of three pages and they leap out to stab her heart; 'It would be a shame for the entire Diocese to see these. I'll be in touch. Don't go to the Police.'

Spread out on her desk, the multitude of color images sear her eyes as she sits gasping, trembling violently. Tears sting her eyes, and her heaving breath is loud in the room. Panic makes her nauseous. She covers her mouth with her shaking hand.

xxx

Ziva David enters the Squad Room, carrying a multitude of plastic Evidence boxes filled with spoils from Patrick Reignforest's apartment. Gibbs had wanted to see the evidence collected by the Forensics Team before it went to Abby's lab, so the delivery of these boxes falls to her. She diverts to the Squad Room however; for the few moments when she can be sure no one else is in the bullpen she has something that has to be resolved. She finds McGee working alone and she has endured all the madness she can take.

Leaving the plastic boxes on her desk, she stalks over to where he sits, typing on his keyboard, oblivious to her. Though his body language screams deep annoyance, she doesn't think it can approach hers. "Where were you?" she demands.

Tim looks up at her, his face displaying naked confusion. "I've been sitting here all morning - while _you've _been gone."

"No, where were you _last night_? I went to your apartment - I stayed all night in your apartment. You were not there! Where did you go?"

"Well," he says with a leer she would expect of DiNozzo, "had I known there was a hot woman in my bed, I probably would have gone home."

"Do not try to play games with me. I am not in the mood!"

"Are we married, Ziva?"

"What?"

He touches the bare spot on the back of his left hand. "I asked you if we're married. Because the way I see it, whatever we are outside this room still doesn't give you any rights to demand to know how I come and go. You said we were through. Have you changed your mind?"

"I meant through with your game - not with our–!"

"I don't play games, Ziva. Not anymore. I was out visiting someone, that's all you need to know. And if you want to come over to my place again, just make sure I'm there to receive you – and that I don't have any company."

So furious she fears she will give in to her urge to hurt him if she remains, Ziva returns to her desk, snatches up the stack of Evidence boxes and stalks off. Behind her, she can hear the resumed clicking of keys and every one of them feeds her temper. He had not said who he had been visiting, but she has her suspicions.

When she is finished in the Forensics lab, one of two things will happen and it will depend upon the conversation she will have with Abby. Either she will continue on to the gym for a thorough workout of her tightly held rage or NCIS will need a new Forensic Scientist. Or Chaplain.

xxx

For over two hours Patrick Reignforest has been locked in Interrogation Room One, demanding release, demanding a lawyer, demanding everything he can. DiNozzo and Lee have been watching their prisoner while David brings the items confiscated from his apartment by the Forensics Team to Abby's lab. Gibbs had wanted to see everything first, now they await Abby's report while Reignforest grows more and more agitated.

"Sir," Lee asks diffidently the moment Gibbs enters, not waiting for him to speak, "why have you not called his lawyer?"

Gibbs looks down at her, feigning surprise, "Why would I do that, Lee?"

The woman is astonished. "Sir, you have said that you want this case handled by the boo–"

"We did call his lawyer," Gibbs cuts her off, hiding a smile behind a stern expression. Sometimes playing with the intense woman's head is too easy to be fun. "He's not coming. Your former colleagues in Legal are trying to round him up a Public Defender. In the meantime, DiNozzo's going to have a little chat with him."

"Sir, you _can't_ question him without a lawyer after he has asked for one; if you do, everything–"

It's time to end this. "Do you _see _anyone asking him any questions, Lee?"

"No, sir," she admits reluctantly.

"And you won't. The book says I can now hold him for seventy-two hours – change courtesy of Bin Laden – before even charging him." He looks in at the aggravated man. If anything good had ever come of the post-9/11 era, it is that the old '24 hour before charges' limit has had a well deserved kick out the window. "He's already _been_ charged, now he'll stewing until Legal finds someone. He'll have his lawyer, and I hope he–"

Gibbs cuts the thought off and picks up his black summer weight jacket he'd put over the back of the Technician's chair an hour ago, draws it on and heads for the door. But he pauses before opening it; his jacket unzipped even with the cool air conditioning fighting the late summer heat. "DiNozzo, why is it so cold in here?"

DiNozzo does not feel cold, "It's comfortable, boss."

"No, it isn't." He glances through the window. "Do something about the heat, will you?"

"Riiiight."

"If you need me, I'll be filling the Director in about our potato." He leaves and Lee looks up at DiNozzo.

"Potato?"

"Uh huh. Baked potato," he replies with a grin, stepping over to the thermostat.

xxx

Siobhan O'Mallory sits in Jennifer Shepherd's office, her second cup of steaming coffee in her hand. Spread out upon the desk between them is a collection of personnel files, the next one on the pile open before the priest. She realizes the fingers of her left hand have been working the ends of her long, flame red hair for quite some time, a nervous habit she has tried unsuccessfully for years to break. She puts her hand down on the chair arm, clutches that arm, determined not to release it. The fright she'd received with the morning mail lingers even here, and she has no idea what to do about it without calling for help. That is something she cannot do - her tormentor will take revenge for it, but she can't–

She shakes herself loose from this, tries to focus on answering the question that had been posed to her. "I'm not a Psychologist. I can only advise based on what I see."

"I have all the Psychologists I can handle," Jenny reminds her.

She tries to focus on her assigned task, unsure she can do so. But despite her best efforts it consumes her attention. The paper had warned her not to go to the Police, but she can't sit here opposite the Director of the NCIS without it seeming just like the Police. She had been seeing a Psychiatrist, a fact known only to George Donaldson, since the explosive destruction of her apartment precipitated a series of debilitating panic attacks, but this is _worse_.

This is not the unreasoning dread of unexpected attacks or memories causing the panic attacks now. This is something to be truly afraid of and she cannot – dares not – call for help.

The consequences of calling for help are as severe as not calling for any.

"I'm looking for your impression," Jennifer continues, breaking through her distracted reverie.

"In that case," Siobhan takes a deep breath, tries to calm her nerves, to focus on the man who deserves her help. "My _impression_ is that Agent Barchetta should be given time off. There are many issues he should work over with his wife. I'll be glad to help if either wishes to see me, but they need time together."

Shepherd knows Siobhan is balancing a need for discretion in what she has been told by the man with the concerns of the Organization and does not press for details. She will have those in abundance when she talks again to SSA Marino and the Agent under his command. She had requested the Priest's input as an 'informed outsider' and is inclined to accept the advice. It meshes well with her own decision.

x

"Well, if that's all for today," Siobhan says, standing up abruptly, "I must be getting back." She ignores the still unopened folders between them. If she cannot ask for help, she cannot stand to stay here any longer.

"I'll see you next Tuesday," Jenny says, surprised but deciding not to commenting on the abrupt move. She comes around the desk, escorting the woman to the door, wondering at the tension she has been seeing through the entire conversation.

"By the way," she says to the obviously distracted woman, "I forgot to ask, sorry, how goes the hunt for an apartment?" Perhaps she can ease into whatever the problem might be if she just keeps the woman talking.

"It's going. I'm looking at something on Friday that might ..." she reaches for the doorknob and the words die in her throat. She pulls back. "Director, may I ask you something?"

"Of course." She'd hoped O'Mallory would finally ask.

"I have a problem. And I'm not sure what I can do about it."

"What's wrong?"

x

"Something is happening," she takes a deep, shuddering breath. "Something I can't handle alone." She sips of the hot coffee, tries to steel her nerves. But as she lowers her hand the door beside her swings inward so fast she cannot evade it. It hits her arm, knocks the cup back onto her. The black coffee splashes over her blouse, covering her from chest to the waistband of her skirt. She backs up several steps, hissing in sharp pain, turns away and tugs the shirt away from her body, fans it out and in rapidly to cool the liquid before it burns her worse than the initial pain.

x

"Agent Gibbs, how _dare _you burst into my office unannounced?" Jenny doesn't have to say 'look at what you've done'. Her tone does.

"I'm sorry," Gibbs says, more to Siobhan, whose rapid movements have cooled the liquid enough, but when she turns back the damage is obvious. "Are you hurt?"

She bites back her initial answer which was as hot as the coffee, chooses instead: "No, thank God." She looks down, the black coffee has already darkly stained the entire front of her light blue short sleeved - and newly dry-cleaned - last blouse. "But I can't go out like this." She tries not to let her frustration and anger reach her face over being interrupted from revealing her more urgent problem.

Gibbs strips off his black NCIS Federal Agent jacket and hands it to her. "Here, take this. And please, send me the cleaning bill."

"She certainly _will_, Agent Gibbs." Shepherd declares when she sees O'Mallory hesitate.

x

Siobhan pulls on the jacket, which is more than two sizes too large. To cover the huge stain requires her to zipper the jacket up to her throat.

"Thank you," she says uncomfortably, even while wondering how many dry cleanings this shirt has left in it. "I should be going."

She cannot discuss her problem with the Director while this man is here. It had taken all this time to raise the courage she needed to discuss the issue. She steps around Gibbs to the still open door. "Good morning."

The closing of the door has a grim finality.

x

There had been no coffee left to stain the rug. "Don't say it, Jenny," he appeals, bending over and picking the empty cup off the carpet.

Shepherd restrains herself from the temptation of answering with a swift kick. "I hardly need to, this speaks for itself." As he straightens she pushes, with difficulty, her anger aside. She knows he is under particular stress, but there are times he reaches points that are hard to forgive. She had long been annoyed with Gibbs' habit of doing an end-run around Cynthia Sumner and entering unannounced. It was an accident waiting to happen and finally it had. Further, O'Mallory had been about to tell her something important.

She wonders now if she'll ever know what it was.

Taking the cup from Gibbs and tossing it in her waste basket, she confronts the man. "Now, what do you have that was so urgent?"

xx

Siobhan crosses the elevated platform past the MTAC facility, heading toward the stairs that lead down to the Squad Room. She's frustrated at having been stopped from appealing for help and aggravated at the sudden unwelcome cost she'd been afflicted with. She halts, pulls off her gold frame glasses and the world vanishes before her into an indecipherable blur. Tugging a cloth from the pocket of her skirt, she wipes the tiny spots of coffee that had splashed onto the lenses. Tucking the cloth away, she pulls the glasses back on, the large room reappearing out of the haze.

Her aggravation transmutes to relief and pleasure when she looks down to find Tim McGee working at his desk. The pleasure comes from the realization that he's alone; that for a short period she'll be able to speak to him without his co-workers around to overhear.

There is much she still has to say to her old friend, and he'll be able to help her, perhaps even better than Jennifer. The opportunity almost allows her to forget the now cold wetness of her ruined shirt pressed against her chest.

x

She descends the stairs, comes around and stops in front of his desk. "Hi," she greets him far more casually than she would any other Agent, pushing down her tension. Timmy will be able to help her. He's also distracted; he looks up at her and it seems for just an instant like he doesn't recognize her.

'Well, he's not used to seeing me dressed as an Agent,' she thinks with a smile just for him, 'though I'd look better if this were my size.'

Gibbs and Timmy are each over six feet, Timmy six one, taller than her 'five and ten' and built considerably more ... bulky. This overlarge jacket has the gold representation of their shield hanging significantly below her left breast. If not for the elastic cuffs, the sleeves would cover her hands.

"Hi, yourself," he says with clearly forced casualness.

"Busy?"

"Going slowly nuts," he admits, but then visibly sets aside what had been on his mind. "How about you?"

"A little of the same," she agrees with a forced smile, but then she looks around. The rest of his team may not be present but they're hardly alone. Agents in the other sections of the room are still in earshot, and she really needs a moment to talk. There are three things she has to get off her chest. In no particular order they are what he had said when he believed himself to be living his story and Cearbhall's romantic devotion to her; something Timmy insists being unable to remember; her current dilemma and the on-going matter between them since their thoughtless kiss at that summer Festival. This last has waited long enough to be addressed. It is Time now for all three.

"Timmy, may I speak to you privately?"

He gets up, coming around the desk, trying to think of a private place. Actually, he knows of one - the broken emergency exit on the upper floor - but how to entice her all the way up to it? "Sure."

x

She starts walking toward the elevator, obliging him to join her. "Timmy," she begins softly, keeping her voice low so only he may hear. First things first; she'll address the easier issue before starting on the nightmare. "I've been thinking a lot about what happened in the – at McMillan Park - you know - when we kissed."

She tries her best not to show how uncomfortable she is, speaking of this in public despite the nearest person being yards away. She had, in the past few weeks, been thinking about that incident a lot – dreaming about it even more frequently.

"So have I," he tells her as quietly. "I liked it."

She presses the button, trying not to let him see her smile and utterly failing. "So did I," she admits. "But that's not my point."

"Then what is your point?"

After many moments of silence the door opens. She thanks God no one else is aboard. She couldn't stand it if someone was. They enter, the doors shut and the car begins to descend. She reaches out, throws the emergency switch just as Special Agent Gibbs had done during their private conversation shortly after her appointment to the NCIS Chaplaincy. The car stops and the main lights dim, emergency lighting under the handrails coming on to supplement them.

"I want –" Siobhan begins uncomfortably, then turns, looks up at him. "I _need_ to know what you were thinking." She can't remember the last time she was uncomfortable around him, can't even explain it now. Maybe it's in what she has to say, what she has to admit, but…

"Well," he answers vaguely, "what were you thinking?"

She's not sure why he sounds so vague. It's not altogether unusual for him, but "I'm _thinking_ you're in a relationship with Ziva David and already had Abby Sciuto pining for you, though that seems to be over, or so she tells me. So I think it best that we try our best to for–."

"What would you say if I told you my relationship with Ziva is also over?"

"_What_?" This is the last thing she'd expected to hear.

"I'm leaving her. For you."

x

Siobhan is staggered. This is an appalling betrayal of the woman he loves. He can't mean it. Half of her might want to leap for joy if he did mean it, if he could be contemplating returning to the joy they knew so long ago. No! That's wrong. It was long ago, they've moved on. Far on. She looks up into his eyes, finds no humor in them. "Timmy, that's _crazy_! You love her. You tell me all the time how much you love her. You don't even have to sayit, you show it every time you look at her."

"I love you," he tells her with quiet conviction.

She takes a step back, now more than just uncomfortable. This is not what she wanted to hear. This is no solution at all. If his affections were turning toward her that was one thing, and in another time or place she could cry out in her heart at the sheer joy of it, but is he saying he was going to turn to her, to return to her, by betraying Ziva? No. That thought rips any possible joy from her heart. She can't bear the thought that Timmy - that _Timmy _- could betray someone who loved him and whom he loved.

And this came at the most abysmal time. With the other problems dragging at her, she doesn't need another. "No, Timmy, you _don't_. That was true once, but now we're just friends." She doesn't know why she feels she has to remind him of what they both know so well, only that she does.

"We had our day - and it's over. We can't get back together. We're both agreed it's impossible. You were right, we both have our lives and–"

"No," he advances on her, crowds her. She takes a step back. "I was wrong, and I don't think we should deny our feelings for each other." He steps closer still and she takes another step back, not knowing why but even more uncomfortable with this admission.

"I love _you_. You're all I can think about. When I'm with her all I can think of is you." He takes another step closer, definitely crowding her. "When we're apart I go crazy – and I think you feel the same."

She backs away - into the corner.

She wants to hold him back, vastly uncomfortable with his closeness. Why is he crowding her? Why is he making her so nervous? She's never been nervous with him. "Timmy, I –"

She is unprepared when he grabs her, yanks her close to him. She cries out, startled, her fiery hair flying, her cry cut off by his lips pressed hard to hers.

She struggles against him, astonished by his force, gagged by his kiss, only able to push away a few inches. He never uses force – he'd never forced her but now he holds her pinned, trapped, his arms tight about her, yanks her closer, holds her tightly – too tightly. She tries harder to push him away, pull back out of reach of his lips. That kiss in the park had been blissful. This is torturous. "Timmy, _don't_! What are you–?"

He forces her into the corner by the deactivated buttons, pins her with his larger body. "Timmy!" she exclaims, unable to fight him, barely having inches to move! She can't fight him – can't believe him. "Stop this; have you lost your mind?" She cannot - _will_ not - believe that this is happening! It _can't_ be what–

"Let me go!"

"No," he clings to her tightly, "I know what I want now and it's not _Ziva_!" He kisses her harder, mashing her lips. He never hurt her. He never – ever – hurt her. She struggles, terrified, unable to believe Timmy is doing this to her! She should fight him, should slap him, but this is _Timmy_ and she can't–!

He kisses her so hard it hurts and she struggles harder, terrified by his sudden force. "I want you _back_!" he tells her when he breaks for air, grips her tighter, kisses her even more fervently, his body trapping hers in the corner, in his tight arms.

Broken heart slamming, she doesn't know if, to convince her of his love, he's going to kill her.

x

Siobhan manages to turn her head, breaking the painful kiss. "Timmy, _stop_ it - you're _hurting_ me!" He has to realize it! If he loves her he shouldn't - can't want to hurt her! He yanks her back, pulls her against himself, forces his lips to hers, hurts her with them, squeezes her so tightly she can't breathe. She's too scared to breathe. He's going to kill her with his love. He's too big for her, three inches make him so. He's huge, powerful – she's going to die!

He's pressing into her below and when she belatedly realizes it, when terror allows a tiny glimpse of that reality to slip through, she realizes with absolute, soul-blasting terror that he isn't going to kill her.

He's erect. She can't believe he's erect and pressed against her, that _Timmy's_ excited by molesting - by hurting – her.

Terrified, unable to fight his strength, she shoves impotently with her right hand, while her left scrabbles behind her, desperately seeking the emergency switch. He kisses her harder, his mashing lips agonizing. Her glasses are pushed up by the force of their struggle. Timmy and the car vanish into an indistinguishable blur!

She clutches the glasses desperately with both hands, somehow getting her right hand free and her left forward, no longer able to push at him as she yanks the world back into focus. She dares not lose her glasses or she'll helpless, more helpless than she is now.

Neither arm between them, she pushes without leverage. She gets her head up, manages to break the kiss but exposes her throat to his attack. She keeps trying to push him away one handed as her left desperately seeks behind her for the switch.

"Timmy, this is _crazy_! Stop it!" She shoves with all her might, barely managing a few inches, "Timmy, please let me go! _Please_! You're _hurting_ me!" She wants to offer him a safe way out, praying he will take it! "If you stop now, I'll pretend this _never happened_! Please!"

He pins her more firmly into the corner, rubs his crotch to hers. What had long ago been a delight he's turned into horrendous torture. She fights his tight grip with both hands, pounds uselessly upon his chest. His larger body overwhelms hers, almost smothers her. She thrusts against the wall, barely moves a few inches and now feels the switch stab into her back! She can't reach back to touch it. His crotch, his hard member, rubs into her and for the first time since their teens she's appalled by it. She can't deny it any longer – he's going to _rape _her!

He grabs her jacket, still using his left arm to pin her and yanks hard at the zipper. She clings desperately to the black material.

x

He reaches down and gets his hand under the overlarge jacket. She's appalled, he broke through her defense – _forced_ through her defense. Grabbing the front of her blouse, he yanks down hard enough to almost pull her off her feet. Her glasses slip again and she must clutch them! He yanks again, harder and her blouse tears down her front, the ripping loud in the small car. Panic rips the sanity from her universe. The material comes out from the bottom of the jacket. His hand tears at her bra so hard the front closure breaks! "TIMMY – NO!" He clutches her bare breast, she shrieks as he squeezes tightly, crushes her breast!

"OW! Oh, God, Timmy, _please_! _STOP IT_!" She struggled more desperately, tried to pry his hand off. He squeezes harder.

"No!"

"OH GOD - OW! Please, Timmy, stop! You're _hurting_ me! I _promise_ I won't tell anyone if you–"

His hand crushes her breast again and his mouth drinks in her scream!

x

She twists away, manages to turn about but can't break his grip on her breast. He's behind her now, his other hand grabs her right breast through the jacket, mauling her. _Timmy_ is mauling her breasts!

But the silver switch is in front of her. She shrieks, her breasts explode in agony but she manages to fight the pain, to reach out instead of up, to clutch at the control before he'd yank her back and force her down to her doom.

She throws the switch, the lights come back on full and the car resumes its descent. He yanks her back, his hands clenching her breasts. They feel like he's ripping them off! He bends her backward! He's forcing her down. Terror and agony make her shriek as loudly as she can!

The car doors open, distract him, and there is someone standing at the door. Bracing against the walls, Siobhan shoves with all her strength, knocks him off balance and his grip eases. Gritting her teeth to endure the agony, she turns out of his grip. Now that the door is open, anger overwhelms her terror.

In mind-blasting fury Siobhan aims for the tented target in his pants and kicks him as hard as she can. She doesn't stop as he doubles over with an agonized cry of his own but gathers her shirt hanging below the jacket, clutches them to her agonized chest and batters past the tall man who'd been standing, frozen in disbelief, outside the doors.

Her best friend just tried to rape her!

x

Jimmy Palmer is shocked as Chaplain O'Mallory breaks away from Timothy McGee, kicks him in the crotch as though launching a football at the goalpost and shoves past him. Agent McGee barely - but incredibly - keeps his feet, clutching himself and clinging to the rail.

Dragging his head up, McGee glares the astonished Examiner. "Whatareyoulookingat?" His demand is a vicious growl.

"N - nothing," Overwhelmed by what he had seen in the moments before O'Mallory had struck, he can't move. The doors slide closed between them just as the MP manning the Security Gate reaches the elevator.

"Who was that?" he demands, radio in hand.

"I - I don't know," Jimmy stammers, amazed to realize he is telling the truth. He does not know the man who had confronted him. He doesn't pay attention to the MP initiating an Alert, doubting it will succeed. The Alert is going out for an unidentified man, possibly an intruder, who has attacked a woman in an elevator, not for one of NCIS' most trusted Agents.

Stunned, Jimmy turns to where O'Mallory had retreated, sees her outside the doors, leaning against the left wall, her hand to her face.

He considers following her, but has absolutely no idea what to say about what he'd seen. He hesitates a moment, then a moment too long. She lowers her hand and runs from the door, out of his reach.

x

Siobhan dashes wildly through the parking lot, unable to believe what's just happened. Her best friend just tried to rape her! But the pains in her body are almost overwhelmed by that in her heart. She'd gone to her dearest friend for help and Timmy - _Timmy McGee_ - her oldest and dearest _friend _- someone she'd once _loved _- tried to _rape_ her!

'Timmy just tried to rape me!'

She doesn't _want _to believe it but her torn blouse and the pain in her breasts won't allow her to lie to herself.

'_Timmy just tried to rape me_!'

x

Reaching her green Fiat, she pulls the key ring from her skirt pocket but her hand is shaking so hard she cannot get the key into the small lock. Timmy - _Timmy_ tried–

Using two trembling hands, she manages to force the key into the lock, yank the door open and get in. She locks every door, even knowing she is safe. But, trembling and gasping, she knows she had been safe in the elevator with her dearest friend – until he'd tried to _rape_ her!

The torn material of her blouse hangs out upon her leg from below the borrowed black jacket. She pulls down the zipper, appalled at what she sees.

Her brown stained light blue blouse is torn completely away from her chest. Only the material tucked into her skirt remains intact. The shirt is torn from her right shoulder down to her waist. Her bra, broken in half, leaves her completely exposed. Her breasts are red with the marks of his tight fingers where he'd so brutally squeezed her. Only her stiff white collar remains intact about her throat.

'Timmy just tried to _rape_ me!'

She shoves the material back into the jacket and zippers it up to her neck, hard, as high as it will go and tries to force it more. She never again wants to see that damning sight.

She wants with all her heart to deny this ever happened!

x

'How could - he _couldn't_ - not _Timmy_!'

He'd _protected_ her - cared for her! She'd known he would protect her now. They'd loved each other in the mad fire of youth. As teens they'd made love hundreds of times with wild abandon and sweet gentility - and he'd _never _forcedhimself upon her! _Never_!

Now, years later, she'd _trusted _him and he trapped her in an elevator and tried to _rape_ her!

'He tried to _rape_ me!'

The thought keeps going about and about in her head. She cannot escape it and cannot take it in. It's too _wrong_. Not Timmy.

'_Not_ _Timmy_.'

'Not TIMMY!'

x

Trembling violently, her gasping breath loud in the sealed car, she needs both hands to fit her key into the ignition, and it takes five tries to start the car. She wants - _needs_ - to reach the safety of the Church. She releases the brake, knowing if she can make it home she will be safe.

Except that she's not safe there anymore either, not since that damned letter, those horrible pictures, not like she was safe in the elevator alone with Timmy - until he'd tried to –

She stomps on the brake, the car jerks to a stop. She's trembling too violently. She yanks her glasses from her eyes, the world vanishes in a blur.

She buries her face in her trembling hands. Her shriek collapses into sobs that wrack her body, sobs as brutal as his attack.

'_Timmy_ tried to _rape_ me!'


	8. Infidelitas

Chapter Eight  
Infidelitas

Gibbs hears the shouting through the tight orange corridor long before he reaches Interrogation Room One. Kevin Dewey, a short blond man of perhaps 30 years keeps pace with him, his manner grim. As they near the chambers, the furious obscenities become even more clamorous, and opening the door to the Observation Room only increases the volume of the epithets. Inside the dimly lit room, DiNozzo, David and Lee watch the impotently raging man through the transparent shield.

"I'll have your badges for this, you bastards, you buckets of jizz, you shitheads! You can't keep me locked up in here like this, you Nazis! I'll sue you, your Agency, your Government, your _Mothers_! Let me out of here, you _fu_–!" DiNozzo flips the speaker switch beside the window, cuts off the noise. The raging man sweats profusely. The heat that pervades the room is probably the cause of or contributes to his anger. Patrick Reignforest's face is deep red, his shirt is plastered to his body and his hair to his head.

"He's been going on for about fifteen minutes, actually fairly impressive at this point, but of course we haven't asked him any questions seeing how his lawyer wasn't here." DiNozzo doesn't smile smugly. He lets his voice do it instead.

Tony's sleeves are rolled up. Both women's collars are open by an extra button, Michelle tries to discretely close hers. Ziva is too hot to care.

"DiNozzo," Gibbs looks about the room, "why is it so hot in here?"

"Sorry, boss, the air conditioner's off. I think there might be a short in the line." DiNozzo considers saying this with a straight face to be quite an accomplishment.

"Ziva, see what you can do about the heat before we all bake. In the meantime, DiNozzo, you and Mr. Dewey go in and have a talk. Lee, take a break."

Much as he may be coming to trust the young woman's judgment, he does not want to risk her blurting out anything that might affect this interview. It will be some time still before he is confident in her discretion. When she leaves, grateful to escape the sauna and the barrage of invectives, Gibbs gives DiNozzo a few brief details about the man with him, and the news brings a smile to DiNozzo's face.

x

DiNozzo unlocks the door to 'I-1' and enters, followed by Dewey, finding the still raging man yelling at the one-way mirror, not that he couldn't hear him once they had stepped into the corridor. "Mr. Reignforest," he attracts the furious man's attention as he enters, grateful he is able to cut off the noise of his ranting, "before we begin I must apologize again for the heat. We've been having some problems with our air conditioning. I trust you have not been too inconvenienced."

The Interrogation Room is perhaps twenty degrees hotter than Ob One. Reignforest resembles a denizen of his namesake and even Tony is perspiring more in this sweltering room. He's certain the added heat is the result of its occupant's rage rather than the other way around and looks forward to Ziva's turning the AC on.

"Who the hell is this? Where's my lawyer?"

"Your lawyer has declined to attend. It seems you have been paying him in promises rather than cash for some time now and so he has opted out of this case. This is Mr. Kevin Dewey – of the Washington Public Defender's Office actually, not from the firm of 'Sheetum and Howe'."

Neither man thinks the allusion particularly humorous, Dewey because he has heard variations on it for years, Reignforest because it gives him another focus for his rage.

"What the hell games are you people playing? You have no right to keep me here!"

"Actually we have all the right we need," DiNozzo sits down, his back to the mirror, obliging the sweltering man to come around the table to look at him. The chair is hot too. "Won't you sit down?"

"You think all this is pretty funny, don't you?"

"You're suspected of the murder of Marie Lassiter. I hardly call that a joke."

"I did _not_ murder Marie!"

"But you did know her. Her clothes were all over your apartment, her mail is sent to your–"

"Yes, yes, of course I know her - knew her - but I did not kill her! You kidnapped me and you're letting her killer escape!"

"Your car was at the scene of her death, a black 2004 Lincoln Mercury, Washington license–"

"My car was stolen!"

'All right, I'll play this one.' "Did you report it?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"This afternoon."

"The car was at the Mall where Ms. Lassiter died yesterday morning."

"I just noticed it gone about an hour before you and your goon squad busted my door down."

"Do you own a rifle?"

"Don't answer that." Dewey directs him.

"No way, I'm through talking."

"How long did Ms. Lassiter live with you?"

He glances at Dewey, who nods. It is an innocuous question, one easily answered in various records or interviews with neighbors. "Two years."

"And in those two years, what was her physical condition?"

"Why, you asking if she was a good lay?"

"Mr. Reignforest," Dewey protests, trying to rein him in. The man's cocky attitude will help his case no more than his temper had.

"No," DiNozzo says tersely, "I'm asking about her medical condition." 'No wonder Gibbs slaps people.'

"Do I look like a groinocologist?"

'Oh, for a world without lawyers.' "Did you know she had cancer?"

"The only cancer she had was her ex-husband."

x

"Would you mind explaining that?"

Dewey shakes his head, but his client has already made up his mind. "Yes, I'd mind. I've answered enough of your dumb-ass questions. Find the guy who murdered Marie and let me out of here."

"Mr. Reignforest, you are not going anywhere and stonewalling is only going to keep you in this room until you're old and gray, or at least broiled until the AC is fixed. You're here on suspicion of murder, that's not going to go away and neither am I. And believe me, in the old 'good cop, bad cop' scenario I'm definitely the good cop. You do _not_ want to meet the bad cop."

"Bring 'im on."

"You have a death wish."

xxx

"He _what_?" Michelle exclaims. All heads turn toward her as she sits opposite her fiancé in the Employee cafeteria. She tries to force her voice back down. Jimmy has, so far as she knows, never lied to her but this is utter lunacy!

"Special Agent _McGee_?" she demands in an astounded whisper, ignoring the attention she's generated. In time it will dissipate, provided he doesn't shock her again. "Impossible! You look up 'Boy Scout' in the encyclopedia, his picture's there."

"'Chelle, I _saw_ it!" Jimmy whispers as emphatically, leaning across the small table.

"What did you see?" There has to be a mistake.

"I heard it first - a woman screaming, pleading for help even before the car doors opened. Everybody in the lobby heard it. I was about to grab whoever it was until they opened and I was so shocked I couldn't move!" He forces his whisper lower, leans closer.

"He was behind Mother O'Mallory, had her pinned in the corner of the elevator. He had one hand up under her jacket, the other outside it, grabbing her breasts. She shoved back, knocked him off balance and kicked him in the … well… then she shoved past me and ran out of the building."

"And what did he do?" This is too incredible. He recruited the priest into NCIS, knew her for...

"That was the weirdest thing of all. He's doubled over, clinging to the rail, then he looks up and sees me and he's _mad_. I have never seen him so angry. He looks at me and wants to know what I'm staring at, but before the doors close our eyes meet, just for a second..."

"And?" she presses when he pauses, annoyed at his stop.

"I don't know. There was something 'Twilight Zonish' about it. Looking into McGee's eyes at that moment there was something... I don't know. But I know I _never_ want to be in an elevator with him."

x

"Come on." Now he's making her nervous. Unbidden, last night's dream comes back to her with chilling clarity.

"What I saw in his eyes ... You stay away from him."

"Come on," she's had enough of ghost stories, "I _can't _'stay away from him'. I work with the man."

"Next time you're with him, take a good look. I found him molesting a _Priest_, and he was really _pissed_ she got away. You look at him and you ask yourself if you _want _to work with him." He reaches out, takes her hand. "At any rate, don't ever be alone with him."

"I'll try," she promises, not really sure why she's promising. The whole thing is ludicrous. She looks past him up to the clock on the far wall. "I have to go." She stands up. "If you're so sure of what you saw, then you should report it."

"First I'll talk to Dr. Mallard."

"You do that."

xxx

"Listen to me!" DiNozzo cuts off Reignforest's flood of invectives, thoroughly fed up and wishing Gibbs or Ziva would turn the damned AC back on. "Believe it or not, I'm your best hope of coming out of this not looking at life in prison for premeditated murder. You say you didn't kill Marie Lassiter."

"Now you're getting it."

"Do you know who did?"

"No."

"You knew she had cancer?"

"Yes."

"Yet you describe her cancer as her ex-husband."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because he was eating her up inside, worse than the cancer in her body. Her hatred for him was killing her more than it was."

xx

In Ob-One the words hit Gibbs hard. Marie had cheated on him while he was an SAA overseas. He'd divorced her. Sometime thereafter, to cover the pain like a scab, she had become a check he wrote each month somewhere between his electric and credit card bills.

He'd worked hard to care nothing for her or what feelings she might have, just as he had with his other exs. The hurt he bore had been made manageable by thinking of her as a blue slip to be filled out and signed and a postage stamp to mail it. Eventually he'd reduced even that degree of feeling to the rote of pen strokes. If _she_ had any feelings about him, he'd trained himself not to care.

Now his connection to her, recently reestablished, has become much more. But he still allows himself no care about feelings - hers or even his own.

To him, she's now a mystery to be solved and justice to be rendered.

To her, he was a cancer.

xx

"Why was he eating her up? Our records show she and her ex-husband were divorced eleven years ago. That's a long time to nurse a grudge."

"Nurse a grudge?" Reignforest repeats. "_Nurse_ a _grudge_? You have no idea what it was like. At first it was resentment that she couldn't let go of – did you know the bastard was overseas for months and left her all alone? She says she sought out companionship in her loneliness and one day, without warning, the door opens and he walks in on her and her friend. She says he never even considered listening to her, she was served with papers the very next evening."

"Tragic. Did you know her then?" It's as much to ask 'were you the guy in the bed?'

"No, I only met her six years ago and never even saw that bastard. I wouldn't recognize him from Adam. But barely a day went by when, no matter what I did, he didn't come between us. He ruined her life."

"Did you kill her?" DiNozzo asks suddenly, hoping to provoke a startled answer.

"No."

"Do you have any idea who did?"

"Oh, yeah!"

"Who?"

"Leroy Jethro Gibbs."

x

Ziva David turns to her boss, seeking something in his face following this indictment, but his expression betrays nothing.

"One of them bought a rifle," he tells her, not taking his eyes off the man at the table, "and all the equipment to impersonate one of us. You and McGee search credit cards, checks, e-mails, everything. Find them."

She takes a step away, but then reconsiders, turning back. "Are you going to be all right?" The expression he turns to her is completely closed. "Right."

xxx

In Saint Mary's Rectory, Father George Donaldson goes to his sink with a glass, turns on the hot water and is surprised to find it running cold. He can hear faintly, from upstairs, the water taps in the bathroom being turned off.

It's still odd, sometimes, for him. Used to living alone in the large house - more for expectation's sake than any practicality - it's odd to be temporarily sharing the Rectory with his Curate. She's lived here for some weeks until other accommodations can be found. She should've - would've been here all the time but for the 'public expectations of propriety. Unmarried man and woman, both parish priests, sharing a Rectory. Heavens, the sky will fall in!

But it's done now, and though he'd had some uncomfortable moments, they've adapted. And there's still talk. Always will be.

But they get along well, mostly by respecting one another's privacy.

But now, an unusual thing like no hot water makes him aware that he's heard the shower running but had ignored it, not really 'hearing' it. He realizes he'd been hearing the water running for quite some time.

She's certainly not the kind to hog the hot water. Her showers prior to his in the mornings are usually reasonably short, there's plenty of hot for both of them. He knew she was going to her other job at the Washington Navy Yard today while he celebrated the Noon Mass, but he hadn't seen her since. He sets down the glass and heads for the stairs.

On the second floor, at the end of the hall, he's about to knock on the bathroom door when he stops, more surprised to hear muffled crying within.

x

This is truly unusual. Not long ago she'd been subjected to extreme stress. Not only had they lost two friends and loyal parishioners - both of them assistants in the church - to unimaginable violence but _she'd _been stalked by the madman. She had held together admirably.

When someone had blown up her apartment and everything in it, including many cherished possessions, she had been philosophical - at least publically. She'd derided the need for possessions while only life was important, insisting that things could be replaced. Not once had she lost her composure over her losses - at least not so he would be aware of it.

Now he listens to her muffled sobbing and knows he has to make a decision. She had not broken before that he was aware of, now he considers balancing this against her obvious distress now and her doing it in seclusion… "Discretion be damned," he mutters and knocks sharply. "Siobhan?"

x

The sobbing cuts off as though by a switch, but it is several seconds before she answers. "What?"

The voice is heavy with misery, and he knows full well she would have said 'yes'.

Conventions suggest his next question, so he gives in and asks it. He feels it's the most monumentally stupid question he could ever ask. "Are you all right?"

"Fine." It comes out in two syllables. He believes neither of them.

"I'll be here when you come out," he promises.

"George - I'd really rather be alone."

Of that he has no doubt. But what kind of friend would comply? "I'll be here when you come out."

x

It is four long, silent minutes before the knob turns, the door is pulled inward and she steps out into the hallway, not meeting his eyes. It's not difficult for her to avoid the connection since she's holding her gold framed glasses clutched in her right hand.

He knows she's blind without them. He supposes the hall must, to her, look like dark sides of a blurred, foggy tunnel, light in the middle from the window behind him broken by a darker smudge; himself. From an early description he judges everything before her is blurred to an indecipherable haze.

The only reason she's not wearing her glasses, he reasons, is because she doesn't _want _to look at him.

He, however, can see her quite distinctly and is very displeased by what he sees. She wears her favorite overlarge red robe, large enough on her to wrap completely about her twice and she has it drawn and cinched tightly so that at five-ten she's almost lost in it. Her feet are bare - she'd obviously brought no slippers in with her - and her long red hair is slicked back from her naked wet face. Her red eyes are swollen from her tears.

It is an image she's never presented before. She'd lost two close friends within two days; had been stalked, tormented and almost murdered; and in doing a favor for an acquaintance she'd escaped death by seconds when her apartment had been blown up. She looks more devastated now than by the sum of these tragedies.

She looks down and away, despite the fact that she can't see him. If her old description of her vision had been adequate, she can't see anything.

x

"George, I really don't want to talk." Her voice is a strangled whisper, tight with barely held emotion. In the bathroom, scrubbing the shame away, she'd wanted to shriek, to scream in insensate fury at Timmy's brutal betrayal, but had not. She'd held her rage back in silence.

She had cried silently, letting the rushing water drown her out and carry her tears away. Then suddenly the hot water had expired and the blast of frigid water had ripped the control from her. She'd hurriedly turned the water off, escaped the icy assault and nearly fell out of the shower but collapsed onto the seat beside it, unable to stop crying. She'd tried so hard to stop, only to have her tears give her away. When she'd heard the knock misery, guilt and shame tore at her. She'd begged to be left alone - her friend wouldn't. Now misery so floods her there is no more room for rage. "Please," she can barely whisper. If she tries to speak aloud she'll shatter. "Leave me alone?"

x

He steps up to her, not really knowing if it will make a difference in her being able to see him but now they are close enough to touch. She looks up at him with naked emerald eyes rimmed in red.

"Tell me it doesn't concern me," he tells her softly, "and I'll leave it alone."

She wants to lie. She so badly wants to lie. But even with her glasses off, even if she can't see him, she has no strength to lie. "It concerns you," she admits in a strained whisper, knowing he would have to deal with it, if only she knew how to tell him.

"What is it, Siobhan? What's happened?" She shakes her head. "Did someone die?"

"No," she whispers, her strangled voice quivering over the word. Her control is about to break again, she strains to hang onto it.

"Is someone going to die?"

"No," she answers even more softly. It hurts to talk, she can't keep it in. Her eyes are wet, but this time not from the shower.

"Then whatever it is, with God's help we can fix it."

"You can't fix it." She's trembling and can't stop it.

"Try me."

She wants to lie. She wants so much to lie. "One of my friends…." Her whispered voice quivers, she can't control it. It's breaking out of her and she doesn't want to say it. But she can't stop. But how to say it? "No, my _best_ friend…" she gasps. Her voice cracks. Tears she can't contain trail down her cheeks. She'd gone to Timmy for help and he'd… "My _very_ best friend…"

"Yes?"

Her control shatters. She throws her arms around him, face buried against his chest, clings tightly to him. "Just tried to _rape_ me."

She can't stop crying.

xxx

Michelle, standing at the file drawers between McGee's and DiNozzo's desks, watches McGee while pretending to comb through the files. She's growing more and more concerned for him. He's frustrated, very angry, his body is the center of a vortex of rage that batters her senses. This isn't like the easy-going Tim McGee who seems able to let the world wash off him.

Normally she would have to open herself, reduce her shields that protect her from being overwhelmed by the world. Everyone has these instinctive shields, she's learned how to drop them, to feel someone's emotions. Now those impressions batter at her until she feels she must raise more defenses against him.

If she were to just use her eyes she could see that, even as his focus seems increasingly fragmented, his frustration and anger grow and have been growing steadily all morning. This is so unlike the easygoing, mellow McGee she can't help but be concerned for him. Even without the outrageous tale Jimmy had carried to her, it's clear that something is dreadfully wrong.

x

When he gets up and stalks out of the bullpen, heading for the elevator, she makes her decision. Hurrying to her desk, she shoves her shield into the waistband of her skirt and her gun onto the other side, snatches her black F.A. jacket and hurries to the elevator. When the destination light shows it's descended to the garage, she presses the button, summons it back.

She thinks about calling down to Interrogation, to inform her boss of McGee's odd behavior - especially in light of his reprimand to them all just last evening. As the doors open she has her cell phone in her hand, but hesitates.

He'd ordered them to report, but Rule 22 says 'Never, ever bother Gibbs in Interrogation', to which she can append 'especially when he's interrogating the murderer of his ex-wife.'

x

Michelle reaches the garage in time to see the rear bumper of McGee's car go out of sight up the ramp to her left and she hurries to her own car. There is a difference between acting on impulse and following a Goddess-inspired hunch and her instincts tell her she should keep Tim McGee in sight.

She knows that, if she hurries, she can make up the time he'll lose as the Sentries open the main gate.

She does, in fact, arrive at the gate just as Tim's car turns right and proceeds away. She gets out of the Navy Yard while the barrier is still raised, tailing him as he turns left on the next block. She doesn't follow too closely, using the recommended distance for such a tailing operation. The feeling she can barely articulate says that, just as it's important not to lose sight of McGee, it's equally important that he not see her.

She follows at a careful distance; usually allowing another car to get between them as they head northward along 11th Street SE past Lincoln Park, then onto Maryland Avenue NE. McGee obeys all the traffic regulations, signaling well in advance of a turn, not accelerating to beat a yellow light. For this she is especially grateful as she would very likely have to cut through the red to keep him in sight and loudly announce her surveillance.

But where is he going? Lassiter had maintained a P.O. Box and resided in Brightwood to the North of the Navy Yard but they're headed North by Northeast toward Trinidad. She wonders if they'll continue along Maryland or branch off onto either Benning or Bladensburg Roads. If they continue much further, they'll leave the District and enter Maryland not far from Seat Pleasant.

xx

Ziva arrives in the bullpen, expecting to see McGee and Michelle hard at work on their respective assignments and quite surprised to find the area deserted. Where Lee has gone is enough of a question. Why Tim, whose behavior is becoming increasingly erratic and unfathomable, is missing is something more significant, and she is annoyed that she cannot answer it. Are they together? She can only hope they return to their work quickly before a very aggrieved Gibbs calls for one of their reports.

In the meantime, she has an assignment, even if it was to be Tim's. Sitting down at her desk, she opens the financial records of Marie Lassiter and Patrick Reignforest to search for a rifle.

xx

Michelle doesn't tail McGee out of Washington but it's a very near thing. He pulls so suddenly into a parking space in an area littered with warehouses she is caught off guard, goes past him and has two choices. She can park in plain sight in front of him or circle the block to get behind him again, all the while hoping she doesn't lose him.

The only reasonable option being the latter, she turns right - onto a dead end street.

Smothering a curse, she pulls in beside an anonymous warehouse and decides this is actually better. She should be able to return to the corner in time to observe him without being noticed.

Leaning into the passenger footwell beside her, she retrieves a pair of flat black shoes. She may need to move fast and there's nothing worse than to try to make any speed in high heels. As she slips the flats on her feet, tossing the others in their place, she pulls out her cell phone and punches a speed dial combination. She leaves the car, hurries stealthily to the edge of the warehouse on the corner, peeks around the whitewashed cement.

McGee stands in front of a door at the middle of three warehouses, as white and anonymous as its fellows when Gibbs' recorded instructions tell her to leave a message. She realizes he must still be in Interrogation. "Sir, I'm at the corner of..." She records a brief but detailed message before the 'beep' cuts her off.

By now McGee has abandoned the front door and has gone around the far left side of the building. She waits a measured thirty seconds but he doesn't return. Breaking cover, she crosses the street to the middle building, alert for his return. The door he'd been examining is chained shut, secured with a large padlock. She's unable to see anything through the high windows, and standing on her toes only reveals no light within.

x

"What are you doing here?" an angry voice behind her demands. She whirls, finds McGee hasn't returned by the same path but has circled the building. "Are you following me?"

She can hardly deny it. "I'm sorry, Special Agent McGee, I was concerned about–"

"You followed to _spy_ on me!"

"I - that is, sir, I–"

"Just as well you're here," he tells her, anger turned off as if by a switch. "I've been following up leads on a Cold Case and the clues led me here. As long as you're here too, you can help."

"Of course, sir, only ... does Special Agent Gibbs know abou–"

"_Of course_ he knows about it! Who do you think _assigned_ me to this?"

"Well, sir, I just mean it seemed to me that–"

"Do you think you know _everything_ NCIS is doing, _Probette_?"

She is surprised by his tone. Special Agent DiNozzo frequently heaps that epithet upon her but usually he does it with a mocking tone, not with the naked scorn McGee uses. He's usually so polite, so courteous that she doesn't know what to make of the change.

"No, sir," seems safest.

"Right. I trust you know how to pick a lock?" he indicates the heavy silver lock holding the chain wrapped about the door handles.

"Pick a– What about a warrant?"

"I have enough Probable Cause to search the building without one."

"But, sir–'

"_Are you going to question me all day until our suspects come back_, _or are you going to pick that lock_?"

"I–" Something is very wrong - she just wishes she knew what. He is always on her side when it comes to the law and the right way of doing things.

"Unless you happen to have brought a _key_?"

"No, sir."

More surprised by the moment, feeling 'procedure' screaming at her, she nevertheless crouches down, examines the padlock. Removing the small set of tools they each carry as standard equipment from a leather packet in her jacket pocket, she focuses upon getting the lock open. Warnings jangle through her mind. The fact that he's her superior officer and she is following his orders doesn't make up for her concern that everything about this feels wrong.

x

In less than thirty seconds there is a soft click, the hasp is freed from the lock and McGee gathers up the chain, holding the length in his left hand. He draws his gun and pushes open the door.

Sigs in hand and working in careful tandem, they back one another up as they move in. They find, by the dim light of high and dirty windows, that the interior is broken up into several sections. Piled high over their heads, crates are laid out in the haphazard manner more suited to a maze than a storehouse. Michelle supposes there is some efficiency in the layout but she cannot see it. She is more attentive to possible dangers in the dimness. Every irregular intersection is entered carefully, guns ready. She cautiously searches for targets, hoping to find none.

x

McGee guides the way through this maze of storage crates to a wooden outcropping of a room, fifteen by fifteen, built into the far left corner. The left and back walls are the sides of the warehouse. He pulls aside the unlocked latch and opens the door; the interior is black as pitch. He signals Michelle to go in first and the alarms ringing in her head rise to a shriek.

She looks up at the towering man. McGee would never send her into a dangerous setting first! Agent DiNozzo had earlier used the term 'un-McGee-like' - she decides it was an understatement.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" he demands in a biting whisper. She looks into the blackness, then back up at him. "Get in there!"

Following orders has never felt worse, but she follows them, trying to force down her apprehension. She actually hopes the unknown dangers within are worse than having this man at her back. They enter, but when he allows the door to close behind them they can see nothing. For an instant her mind flashes to solitude, an elevator and Jimmy's warning.

x

Light bright enough to sting her eyes flares in the center of the room. Michelle, squinting at the burst of illumination, holds her hand up to protect her eyes and is astonished to find a shirtless man hanging before the opposite cement wall.

He hangs suspended from the ceiling by chains that extend from opposite walls. His wrists are encased in heavy clamps. He can touch the floor but his head hangs slumped forward. Perhaps he's unconscious, perhaps he's dead.

His body is covered with bloody welts and bruises. Long strips of burned, charred flesh crisscross his chest, arms and stomach in a map of blackened pain. Michelle takes a step toward this broken man, searching for a way to free him. She can see he's alive, he's breathing but hangs slumped, completely limp. He must have heard them, however, for he struggles to raise his head, great pain slowing his movements.

Michelle stops short with an astonished gasp, staring in disbelief at the bloody, battered face of Timothy McGee.

"_Run_!"


	9. Inquisition

Chapter Nine  
Inquisition

Michelle ducks to her right, avoids a punch from behind, completes the turn to the 'McGee' she'd entered with. Her foot comes up in a high arc, her heel slams into the side of his head. The kick knocks him aside even as the Sig is ripped from her grip. She twists to the side, realizes that, momentarily blinded by the light, she hadn't seen the two men and a woman enter behind them.

Moving as quickly as she can, she attacks with feet and hands, knees and elbows, offering no mercy. She's fighting for her life and Tim's. Kicking and slashing, ducking, weaving and leaping, she calls on all her karate and judo skills, NCIS training and Mossad coaching. Lashing out as hard as she can, she keeps out of the reach of the four, moving with Ninja-like silence, taking every advantage her smaller stature allows.

The men move like bulls, probably used to slugging it out toe to toe with other men. She realizes they have no idea how to fight a smaller woman who knows how to use her stature and her skills.

A hard kick to one man's face knocks him spinning in the air to fall flat upon his face. A judo throw of the fake McGee body slams him to the concrete floor. She doesn't try to get in a 'crotch shot' but when one of the men leaves her an unguarded target she's ready. His falsetto scream slices through the small room as he crashes to the floor.

The three remaining assailants, considerably worse for wear, surround her. Michelle changes her tactics. Rather than silent devastation, her piercing screech deafens everyone, including herself. She renews her vicious attack. A punch to the throat drives the bogus McGee into the wall. Vicious kicks knock the second man over a table. She'd tried very hard to break at least one of his ribs, sorry she hadn't managed it.

She turns to meet the charge of the blonde woman and an instant later pain explodes in her lower back. The third man's fist slammed into her left kidney. She's stunned by the incredible pain, unable to move. He grabs her and throws her backward to the floor. She slams so hard her head bounces on the concrete and four bodies pile atop her. Her wrists are grabbed, pinned to the floor and hands tear at her blouse, the material shreds loudly.

"Hold on," the woman's voice cuts through the press of bodies, "what do you think you're doing?"

"The bitch kicked me in the nuts!" one angry voice retorts as Michelle manages to look up past a shoulder up to the bruised face of Tim McGee. She's trapped at his feet. "As soon as I stop hurting, she's going to pay!"

Tim, held suspended above them, kicks at the men as hard as he can, but backed to the wall he can get no force.

The three men continue tearing at Michelle, ripping off the pink Victoria's Secret silk bra that Jimmy was the only one ever supposed to see.

"Wait!" the blonde woman, the one she's sure the bogus McGee had described yesterday, commands.

"_You_ wait!"

"_Bulls in a China shop_," she exclaims. "We've been trying for two _days_ to break him - and if you break his jaw he can't tell you the code."

They stop their forceful stripping, Michelle's blouse and bra long gone. With her arms pinned over her head, she can't hide herself.

The woman turns to McGee. "You'll die before you give up that code." He nods sharply, defiantly. "But you'll talk before you'll see anything happen to this lovely young lady, won't you?"

x

The men shift positions. The pseudo-McGee holds Michelle's arms high over her head, the other men each taking one of her legs. Despite her struggles, they spread her legs wide. Trapped on the concrete in front of Tim, clad now only in her skirt, she tries not to blush, tries not to think of her exposure.

She can't fight them. Struggle though she does, she's trapped under their strength. The real McGee, suspended against the wall, continues trying to kick at them, but in their frenzy the men ignore the blows.

One of them, angered by Tim's relentless attacks, gets off Michelle and hits him, a vicious punch to one of his livid wounds. A harder assault to his burned flesh makes Tim writhe in silent agony. Grimacing, unable to breathe, he hangs, gasping for air as the phony McGee and the other two men drag Michelle out of the wounded agent's reach.

"Whatever they do, Agent McGee sir," Michelle cries, trying to ignore her exposure, "whatever they want, _don't _give it to them!" She neither knows nor cares what it is, if it's important enough for him to hold out through two days of torture, she doesn't want to become the thing that changes his mind.

Tim's warped twin traps her wrists crossed over her head, leans his weight on her and his free hand squeezes her breast tightly.

Michelle bites her lips to hold them together. The pain is horrendous but she won't make a sound. He squeezes tighter, the agony stops her breathing. She concentrates only on enduring the pain. He twists hard, the agony increases a hundredfold but she keeps silent.

"Idiot," the blonde exclaims angrily, kneeling down between Michelle's spread legs and knocking his hand away, "you have no idea what you're doing."

Michelle, freed of the horrendous agony, gasps deeply, finally able to breathe. It's hard but she manages to hide the lingering pain and look upward, meeting the fake McGee's eyes. She smiles in mocking triumph. "My last boyfriend -" she gasps, "- hurt me worse."

The imposter draws back his fist and Michelle smiles more sweetly, ready to shift aside if she can goad him into striking. 'Maybe he'll break his fist on the cement,' she hopes.

x

"Stop, you imbecile," the blonde woman, clearly established as the leader, commands bitingly. Still kneeling between her widely spread legs, she reaches under Michelle's skirt, tugs her panties aside. The helpless Agent looks up at her, tries to hide her fear as she strains for escape.

Michelle's is determined to show nothing of fear. Her lips clamped tightly together, she will give the bitch _nothing_. She feels the woman's questing, probing fingers past the yanked aside crotch of her panties and braces herself to show nothing, no matter what the blonde monster does.

"When it comes to the really _sensitive_ parts," the blonde bitch tells her fellows with a feral grin, "only another woman really knows _**how**_!"

Michelle flings her head back and shrieks.

x

Helpless, pinned by the three men, Michelle writhes helplessly under the woman's vicious assault. She refuses to scream again, clamps her lips together between her teeth. The false McGee summons one of the men to take hold of her arms. Michelle can't close her legs past the sadistic woman's body before her ankles are secured again.

The evil clone gets up, faces his captive original. His stolen jacket is torn, his face scuffed and bleeding, but he projects himself the merciless victor. "See that?" he points to the suffering woman. "That's just the _beginning_ unless you give us the code."

Tim stares at Michelle, whose tiny cries forced from clamped lips are testament to horrendous pain as she struggles helplessly and his heart breaks.

"No."

x

"What is it with you?" the doppelganger demands of his suspended captive. "You've got all those cunts falling all over themselves for you. Ziva, Abby, they'll endure _anything_ for you. I took Ziva to your special spot but she didn't _like_ how I played your game. Seems she's not into biting, being punched or _raped _on the steps." He grins in sadistic delight at the horror in his captive's eyes. "But that's _nothing_ compared to what I did to that other one. I _raped_ her in the elevator just like we're going to do to this one. She didn't even _report _you."

Tim stares at him in horror as his twin grins triumphantly.

"But what _screams_ - how she _begged_ me to stop–."

"_Who_?" Tim can't endure it anymore. The bastard raped Zee and another of his friends? Who?

"I don't know, she was just another twat in one of those black jackets." he smirks. "She tried so hard to keep it closed, but I was more interested in what she had between her legs. And she couldn't believe her Tim McGee had her on her back and was giving her the porking of her life! She was so sweet. She shrieked her head off when–"

"_WHO_?" Tim's yell crams the room with his fury, drowns out Michelle's muffled cries.

"Don't know. The redhead," 'McGee's' grin is pure evil as the horror blooms in his captive's face, "the _Irish_ one."

x

Even held upright by heavy chains, Tim's rage lets him charge his doppelganger. All he wants is his upraised hands about the monster's throat – but his tormentor has stood just an inch out of reach. "You _bastard_ – I'll kill you!" he rages, straining to reach him, face contorted into a mask of murderous fury. "I'LL _KILL_ YOU!"

The imposter places his hand on the bloody wound on Tim's chest, pushes hard as Tim falls away, driven back by a blast of agony.

"You'll _watch_ as we take turns now with _this _bitch, and you'll remember your screaming girlfriend as she lay under me on the elevator floor _begging_ me to stop. All you have to do to save this one is to give up the code."

He releases Tim and leaves him hanging, gasping in pain. He goes over and pushes the woman out of the way, interrupting the agonizing torture that has Michelle writhing in agony. He opens his belt. Michelle's skirt is about her waist, her panties broken at the crotch.

"_Imbecile_," the blonde woman pushes him away, "you think rapeis the worst thing that can happen to a woman? Every man thinks of that. She's obviously been trained to endure it." She leans harder on Michelle's knee as the naked Agent looks up at her, defiance blazing in her eyes. "Get some ropes; secure her there," she points to a floor to ceiling pipe by the door. "And there," she indicates the heavy desk across the room. As the two men hold Michelle's arms above her head and her legs spread wide, the blonde woman reaches for her but looks up at Tim. "By the time I'm done, she won't ever let her boyfriend near her again."

"Goddess, _please help me_!" Michelle implores in a desperate whisper. She tries her best to endure the intimate attack. Her pleading whispers to a host of women's names, none of whom they may know, are the only sound she'll allow herself to make.

A sharp twist of her tormentor's hand, Michelle's body arches in agony, her shriek reverberates in the small room.

xxx

At Gibbs' direction DiNozzo takes a well needed break, leaving Reignforest in the Interrogation Room to stew in the lingering heat. He's not pleased to learn that Gibbs had directed Ziva to leave the thermostat alone. Sweat runs down his back, making him itch. His brilliant plan is starting to backfire.

No matter how confident DiNozzo manages to appear in the room, he knows their case hinges on one piece of evidence they don't have - the rifle. Without it, they can't lock down Reignforest's guilt. Without it Dewey might just accomplish the unthinkable - allowing a murderer to walk free.

Feeling he needs to blow off some steam, DiNozzo takes the stairs downward to the lowest sub-basement. In all this talk of guns he needs to squeeze off a few rounds, perhaps imagining Riegnforest in the target.

NCIS has an outdoor target range at which every Agent must regularly prove his or her ability on a regular schedule. However, it also maintains a three person range in the sub-basement, some would say conveniently below Autopsy. There is no rating or evaluation here; you may compete against yourself or a fellow Agent. It's not unknown – though neither sanctioned nor admitted – for several pieces of green paper to ride upon the results of an afternoon's practice.

When Tony opens the soundproof steel door he hears the sound of gunfire. Of the three shooting stations just within the long room, the middle and right ones are occupied. Seeing the two women already using the range, DiNozzo decides there are certainly far more effective and pleasant distractions than guns.

Even from behind, their heads and ears covered by heavy earphones that muffle the loud reports of the guns in the enclosed room, they're unmistakable. In the center spot is Supervisory Special Agent Martine Joswig, her hair drawn back into her characteristic long pony tail. She stands about an inch over Ziva David's height, a fraction shorter now because her legs are braced to the limit of her blue skirt to balance against the kick of the gun. DiNozzo takes a pair of safety earpieces and goggles and dons the first against the loud shots.

To her right is a taller, willowy woman with long light brown hair and a respectable figure that, if he were not emotionally attached to Jeanne Benoit he might...

Then again, maybe he would not. Melanie Kelman, in her mid-20's, had joined NCIS straight out of college and had spent the past three years turning down his attentions. She'd said she doesn't believe in dating within an organization, certainly not among people of differing ranks.

But then, after years of Joswig's saying she would not use a Senior Field Agent, not caring for the division within her team, she'd recently promoted Kelman to that rank; his own rank, so maybe...

x

Joswig stops firing and presses the button on the platform before her, drawing the target quickly sixty feet to stop before her. The target is a representation of an armed man holding a terrified female hostage. Her body is in front of his, preventing a shot to the heart. The only available shot is to the assailant's head, a difficult shot indeed at nearly twenty meters.

"Not bad," DiNozzo grants, alerting the women to his presence. They turn to him. "Good grouping," he says appreciatively as he pulls off his earcovers. There are six bullet holes in the head, two to the neck - each of the latter still an ultimate kill shot. The remainders are to the heart. The women remove their own headpieces. From the front, each of them are even more interesting than from the rear.

"Thanks," Joswig says. With her hair drawn back she looks even younger than her thirty five years, and Tony takes a moment to appreciate the depth of her brown eyes.

"Not as good as the Maestro, of course," he tells them, "but respectable."

"Who, Gibbs?" she asks with a baiting smile. She'd trained under Gibbs as his first Probie when they had both worked, along with Jennifer Shepherd, under Mike Franks.

"I was referring to myself, actually." He doesn't care for Joswig's smile. "I happen to be the best on our team." That earns him an even more dubious look.

"Maybe, but you're nowhere as good as Melanie."

"Really?"

She shrugs. "Sorry, you just never will be," she says dismissively.

"Ho hooo; that sounds like a challenge. The Probie better than _moi_?"

"Marti…."

Joswig's smile just broadens more, her tone becoming even more openly dismissive of his talents even as she ignores Kelman's tone. "She just is. You can't shoot as well."

"Well, why don't we see about that?" Willing to play along with her, he'll give her Probie a lesson in marksmanship. He draws his Sig and checks it. "Best of one clip," he pushes the button controlling the target to his right in front of Kelman to bring it sliding forward even as he replaces Joswig's target sheet with a fresh one.

"Wanna make it _really_ interesting?" Martine asks, making the offer sound particularly juicy as Kelman reaches for the fresh target. Her body language screams that she wants out of this, but that she won't go against her Supervisor. Fine with him.

"Define 'interesting'." He suspects he knows.

"A hundred dollars?"

This makes Melanie hesitate again, and while she replaces the clips, Tony having a chance to look it over. All head shots, reasonable grouping on six but one is to the left of the man and one had gone right through the hostage's nose. He's sure he can do better.

He'd heard of Joswig from other Agents. He knows she doesn't gamble - but if she _does_ bet, and it's a hundred, then she considers the bet to be a sure thing. He'll show her a sure thing.

He knows all too well what the firing range is like. One day, admittedly on the outside range and with Gibbs watching, it had cost him his favorite cap and Kate Todd her palm pilot. But that was three years ago, and it's Kelman's boss who's watching now, who's about to lose a C-Note. Granted on that day he'd also hit the hostage, but that was her ear, not through the middle of her face.

He grins, wanting this contest now. "You're on."

x

"Marti..." Kelman protests again, her increasing discomfort allowing her to finally break in on her boss.

"Not backing out, are you, little lady?" DiNozzo challenges. Having seen that grouping, the miss and the fact that she'd killed the hostage, he wants the hundred dollars. She looks like she's going to back out but Martine fixes her with her eyes and shakes her head.

"No," Melanie says quietly, her tone making it quite clear she doesn't want this, but she'll fulfill her boss' intentions.

"I'm looking forward to dinner on you, DiNozzo." Martine declares confidently.

"Then you'll be dining on crow," he assures her. The push of two buttons sends the targets sliding sixty feet back to the far wall. "Lady first."

"No, you go first," Joswig says. "We insist."

"All right." Smiling confidently DiNozzo resets the headpiece over his ears, puts on the safety goggles, picks up his Sig and takes careful aim at the distant figure. The target jumps only slightly as he puts the first bullet through the center of the perp's head, a definite kill shot. It moves a bit more when the nose is pierced, the remaining six bullets move the target as slightly.

When the gun is empty, he presses the target button and the large rectangle slides across the room. Eight shots, all to the head, though he'd put one in the man's mouth just for style. "I think I'll order lobster topped off with a bottle of their best champagne."

"Don't drink it too quickly," Martine advises as Melanie sets up for her own volley. DiNozzo watches with interest, appreciating her form as well as her technique. She levels the gun, takes a calming breath and lets it out slowly, relaxes and fires.

x

The target before the far wall moves slightly and DiNozzo can just see the small hole appear in the center of the assailant's forehead. The gunman is dead. 'Not bad,' he grants silently. Kelman's second shot, however, doesn't move the paper, nor does the third. The woman continues firing, squeezing off one shot after another in a slow, steady rhythm. None of her shots register on the large paper.

DiNozzo starts to feel bad for her, fearing she's slipped under the pressure. Her boss had trapped her in this bet and he considers calling it off. Winning is one thing, but this is no contest at all. How does someone with such poor aim qualify for a carry permit, let alone...?

When Kelman is finished she presses the button, drawing the incriminating paper back across the room. There is only the single hole in the center of the man's head.

He tries not to let them see his ambivalence. "Well, ladies, I hate to say 'I told you so'. Your first shot was good but, as you can see, the others," he waves his hand over the unmarked paper, "clean misses."

"Not exactly," Melanie maintains.

"Come on, we all saw it." He doesn't want to think the woman is going to be a poor loser, but, "One hole, seven misses. Sorry, but that dinner is going to taste so good."

"Look again, my friend," Joswig points at the target with a triumphant smile. "That's one bullet making the hole - and seven more _through_ the hole."

x

Tony looks, looks again, gets up to the paper until his nose is virtually touching it. He sees the very slight damages to the fiber of the paper on all sides of the hole, which is only slightly wider and more irregularly shaped than a single bullet can manage.

"I - will - be - _damned_!" He turns back to the grinning Senior Agent, then to her less amused companion. "How the hell did you do that?"

"Simple," Kelman assures him. "I'm intimately familiar with this gun. Factor in resistance of the muzzle, compensate for micro-expansion as the barrel heats and adjust the trajectory. It's simple math."

"Simple math." He takes out his wallet, counts out a hundred dollars and hands it to her. He doesn't mind losing, he's far too impressed. "Just one thing, how come your other target wasn't like that?"

She shakes her head. "That wasn't my target, we just got here." She hands the money to Joswig. "I was waiting until Marti shot her clip. I don't know whose that was; someone who didn't police his work."

Tony smiles ruefully. He hadn't _asked_ if Kelman had fired at it. Well, at a hundred dollars this life lesson has come steep; but if he has to lose, it's good to lose to - and be impressed by - someone so phenomenal.

"You know," Martine says, enjoying the moment, "I just wish this range had those cameras pointing in like on the public ranges. I'd _love_ to have had a picture of your face when you saw that grouping." Tony suddenly freezes, then he feels his mouth slowly falling open. "Agent DiNozzo, are you all right?"

He snaps himself out of it. "Ladies - _Dear_ Ladies - I hope you enjoy that dinner and that you'll allow me the chance to take you out on another. Right now, I have to _fly_!" His hug of each of them comes so quickly neither can protest or push him off. He's out the door before either woman can say a word.

xxx

Kevin Dewey confronts Gibbs and David in Observation One. "How much longer is this going to take?" he demands. "We've been sitting in that _sauna_ for _over two hours_ waiting for your man!"

"Sorry the AC's still on the fritz," Gibbs tells him with almost a little sympathy. "If you wanna leave, you're welcome to. We're keeping him. If my man doesn't have any questions right now–"

"This is outrageous! Two hours ago you had no evidence against my client and you still don't! Your claim to jurisdiction is specious at best. It was Lassiter who was found allegedly impersonating a Federal Agent, but you cannot charge the dead. You have no evidence against my client to connect him to that impersonation, let alone any involvement in Lassiter's death. Even if he confesses under interrogation you have no jurisdiction and I intend to file a Motion to Sup–" the door behind him flies open and DiNozzo sticks his head in,

"Sorry I'm late," he says with a disarming grin, then looks to Dewey. "Coming in now? Can't start without you."

x

DiNozzo reenters the smaller room with Dewey in his wake. Reignforest glares at him. It's hard to tell which of them is angrier at the Agent. Tony knows Gibbs would love to apply the coup-de-grace personally, he determines to make the show suitably satisfying for his friend. He shuts the door and sits down, placing the papers he carries face down upon the table before him.

"Agent DiNozzo," Dewey says, "despite this delay, if you have no further evidence against my client then we are finished here."

It gives Tony deep satisfaction to ignore this empty bluster. "You claim to know nothing of the gun used to kill Marie Lassiter?"

"That's right."

"It was, in fact, Marine M40 A1 Sniper Rifle firing a Lapua Winchester .308 Hollow Point Boat Tail. A pretty powerful piece actually, capable of accurate placement at 1000 meters. But it's not a novice's weapon, and a precision shot against a moving target, even if it is withdrawing on a direct line, is a difficult one. I know of only one person who could make it." He turns over the uppermost paper. "Most of us would need practice."

It took DiNozzo two hours to locate footage from a security camera at a public firing range not far outside Brightwood. It shows Patrick Reignforest holding just such a rifle as DiNozzo had described, aimed at a target outside the covered shooting area, the awning of which houses the camera. Beside him stands Marie Lassiter.

"I don't suppose you remember this either?" The next paper is a reproduction of a scanned credit card receipt, dated 8 months ago, from a Sporting Goods store and bearing Reignforest's signature. The receipt is for a box of .308 Winchester Hollow Points.

SSA Harry Grant and his team had turned up the original receipt in quick order once Ziva, searching through Reignforest's financial records, had told them where to look.

x

The next paper DiNozzo turns up is an Ebay record from an on-line store specializing in military and police clothing. It's for an NCIS Federal Agent's black jacket and cap, paid for three weeks ago by Marie Lassiter.

"Terrible when things slip through the cracks, isn't it? That's one of the beauties of the electronic age we live in. No record is ever lost."

Reignforest sits staring at his folded hands. He hears Dewey beside him advising him to say nothing. He ignores him.

"She was obsessed," he says quietly. "Even in death she wanted her revenge - revenge she could never get in life. She wanted to take him down, ruin him as she felt he'd ruined her. The only reason I agreed to help was that the pain she was suffering was so horrible this was a quick way to end it."

DiNozzo stands up and steps around the table. Silver handcuffs click as he pulls them from his belt. "Patrick Reignforest, you are under arrest for the willful and premeditated murder of Marie Lassiter." Turning the unresisting man around, he attaches the first cuff. "Anything you say can and will be used against you in a Court of Law."

DiNozzo continues the bland recitation, not caring if Reignforest is listening or not. It's being recorded.

x

Ziva turns off the speaker next to the window, looking up at her boss. "Dewey is right, we cannot use that confession. This case has always been Metro PD jurisdiction." Now that Gibbs' plan is finished, she truly wants answers. The face Gibbs turns to her is grim indeed.

"I don't intend to prosecute. I'm handing all this back to Carpenter." He feels he owes the Homicide Detective Lieutenant, not just for the Hotel Maritz but for the Joralemon case as well. "He gets everything; all the physical evidence, Ducky's autopsy and whatever Abby found. He can use all that to build a case that will put this bastard away for–." He shuts himself up, turns to the door, but though he opens it Ziva's words make him pause.

"But he can't use the confession."

"I'm not giving him the confession," he tells her, looking back. "Carpenter gets the evidence," he pulls the door after him, "the confession is _mine_."


	10. Delphi

Chapter Ten  
Delphi

Tim McGee is so consumed with fiery rage that even the skilled wordsmith he longs to be can't express such passionate fury. That bastard who's stolen his face, his life, has hurt and raped Ziva, he's hurting Michelle right in front of him, reveling in her pain and torment–

He hurt and raped _Shav_!

Torturing him was one thing: his captors had reduced it almost to the clinical, to 'business', as if that could somehow negate the agony and torment he's suffered over these past two days. They want Delphi from him, something he will never give. Whether it's pure business to them or not, he doesn't give a damn!

The woman, that unnamed bitch, had enjoyed his beatings. The torture, the pain - all were at her word and were foreplay to her. Wielding the agonizing prod that had electrified his body and seared his flesh, that was her orgasm.

She'd loved every jerk of his writhing body, every scream of pain brought her ecstasy. She'd held the tormenting rod to his spasming body, his screams racing her orgasms. It hardly mattered to her who broke first.

He'd held his tongue against their demands. They'd wanted more information to allow the doppelganger to fit in undetectably at Headquarters. He'd give the imposter no help in stealing his secrets. Though breaking might have bought short, blissful relief from agony, it was more likely to buy execution.

He hadn't imagined, even with the mind of a writer of 'hard-boiled thrillers', just how much horror was erupting across the city.

He'd thought his doppelganger was just after his code, which not even a lifetime of searching would ever uncover.

He'd also been hurting his friends!

x

Michelle, brutally tortured, now lies bound, naked and unconscious before him, lewdly and obscenely spread as a 'lesson'. The merciless monsters had reduced her to nothing more than a means to an end. Horrible as it is, no matter how he'd strained against his own pain to reach her or pled for mercy for her, at least she knew who was hurting her.

Zee and Shav had not.

The soulless bastard, the monster who'd stolen his face and perverted his life, had violated them! Through every moment of terror they had believed he was doing it. They believed he'd betrayed them, hurt them as no woman should ever be hurt - and if he dies they may never know the truth. Whatever comes, they may believe forever that he had–

When the bastard had told him, Tim had lost his mind. In that moment all he'd wanted was to get his hands on the grinning monster. Not just to kill him but to tear him apart – to dig fingers into warm, yielding flesh and tear meat from bones, to pry out organs and smash them under foot, to rip out red dripping bones and batter his body to unrecognizable pulp, to a shapeless mass of crushed and shredded flesh!

All that time the only things he could see were Zee – _Shav_ – screaming for mercy under a demon wearing his face!

Had they fought back? Or had they seen only Tim McGee and held back? The perversion with his face was whole, unwounded, so Zee had not fought back. Had _Shav_? Had she gone down in terrible revulsion, believing it was he that was–?

Watching the naked woman at his feet beginning to move, beginning to return to her own nightmare, he struggles to push back his own rage, to use his brain.

He's no longer sure that he can do it, only that he must.

x

Michelle opens her tear encrusted eyes, barely managing to focus on Tim McGee, the real Tim McGee, suspended to her left before she turns away, humiliated. Her ankles are tied by ropes to a desk and a ceiling heating pipe, her hands tied high above her head to the foot of a heavy worktable, her body splayed out obscenely.

The torture intended to get McGee to talk over her admonishments not to give in had escalated in violence and sadism as the Agent refused to answer, only t beg for mercy for her.

Each time she'd looked up and saw McGee about to give in, she'd urged him to keep his silence. Whatever they wanted, whatever he had held out over two days of beatings and torture for, he had to keep the secret, no matter what happened to her.

She had tried not to cry or scream, focusing on appeals to Minerva and Venus, Jesus and Mary, Danu and Brigit, all the Gods and Goddesses of all the Pantheons she knew as her tormentors grew more brutal. The men tried to provoke some response, any at all, from her or from the man for whose 'benefit' these torments were inflicted. She didn't scream or beg, her defiant glares only driving them to greater and more agonizing efforts.

At some point one of them had taken her cell phone from what remained of her skirt and had smashed it under foot, destroying the GPS chip that would have aided NCIS in finding them.

Then the fake McGee had pushed past the others, the woman tried to stop him but he wouldn't listen. He shoved off his pants, got on top of her and she tried to keep silent, not to give him what he wanted but the first thrust was horrendous and ripped a scream from her.

It was just the beginning. Each man in turn took her with more brutality than the last. She could only scream her agony, drowning out Tim's furious yells.

The three men took her in turn, each competing to give her the most pain. She's not sure when the agony had grown too much for her to endure. Ultimately everything had simply gone black.

x

Now she awakens to agony, a flood of pain drowning her body, and when she forces her eyes open she can't deny the reality of her nightmare. Naked, her wrists bound high above her head, she strains to close legs spread so lewdly her thighs still ache. She sees Tim McGee hanging suspended from chains above her and turns away, pain warring with humiliation, both abusing her in her helplessness.

She wants to cry but won't - not in front of this man. Red and black mark his body with trails of pain. If he has held out for so long, then so will she.

But how?

Those four had hurt her more than anyone had ever hurt her. They'd focused, predictably, on her breasts and vagina, which hurt so much she wants to scream out, to cry tears of bitter pain - but she won't. Not in front of Agent McGee.

They'd been brutal, and though she'd prayed with all her heart to every Deity she knew, imploring aid and strength and relief, it hadn't been enough. She'd fought back with her healing power to ease her pain even as she'd been overwhelmed, her magical talents a trickle against the flood. She has to focus on a particular pain in order to dull and wipe it away, they were hurting her in too many places, each time breaking her concentration.

They'd kept to just hands, but one of them knew something of pressure points, stabbing agonizingly into her unprotected flesh over and over again until she could no longer contain her screams. When one of them went from torturous hands on her breasts to teeth, to biting deeply into her breasts, her shrieks had echoed off the close walls.

x

The blonde bitch kneeling between her legs had been the worst. The men were mindlessly brutal but she was sadistic, drawing pain she couldn't endure. She'd begun by ripping hair after hair slowly and painfully from her pubic bush, always the ones closest to her vagina, drawing out each solitary pain in steady pressure until the hair came loose, then beginning on the next. When the sadistic bitch had tired of that game she'd stuck her finger inside and used her long nails to….

She'd tried to think of Jimmy, of the pleasure of his gentle touch and fervent lovemaking. The blonde monster ripped these thoughts from her, invading her with agonizing stab after stab. She'd said she'd made no outside marks - yet - but hardly had to.

Michelle hated them, hated _her_, more than she'd ever imagined hating anyone. Wicca teaches to put aside hate, but she can't. She feels like her most intimate flesh has been cut, scraped by nails or worse. Her body screams in pain and her spirit with humiliation and growing anger that will consume her if she dares to allow it.

She forces herself to push back the humiliation of laying naked and spread wide now before this man, her friend and partner, to concentrate on the important.

They endure. They withstand this torment for a reason, for something larger than themselves, whatever it might be. She doesn't know what these bastards want, but he has remained silent over her torture and his own, so she will endure.

They will endure.

They will persevere.

She forces herself to look up at him, forces herself to remember that they are more than a woman and a man, captured and tortured. She focuses on this, trying to push everything else away.

They are more than they seem, each of them, far more – and they must live up to that standard. They're the same, bonded. They are special. They are Special Agents.

They are NCIS!

x

"How long –" she gasps, her throat dry, "– was I out?" It hurts even to talk, and she's sure much of that pain comes from her screams.

"About half an hour," he answers. His voice rasps, distorted by the bruises and wounds covering his face and two days without water - and probably a lot of screaming too. "Michelle, I am so _sorry_."

She doesn't want to discuss it, to think about it, seeking anything else she can find to distract herself from the painful indignities they'd inflicted upon her. She cannot look at him, his body is covered in blood, open wounds and black burns. She doesn't have to imagine his pain, she has her own, but she can't look at him anymore, stares instead at the chains that hold him suspended above her.

She can see in his eyes, when she can force herself to look, the deep pain he would hide. She wishes she could help him, even as she strives to help herself. She could ease his pain. Of all her magicks that is her special talent, but she must touch him to do so and he's so many inches away. Other Wiccans she knows can do it from several feet away, she's not so powerful, not yet. She can barely manage to dim her own pain.

"Who are they?"

"Well," he rasps, "they're 'Yellow', 'Brown', 'Black', you've met 'Green', and I take it their favorite movie was 'Taking of Pelham 123'."

Despite her pain, she manages to smile, "An allusion worthy of Agent DiNozzo."

"Now I _am_ in trouble," he declares gloomily.

x

"What happened?"

"I got home from work ... Tuesday evening. They were in ... my apartment. She distracted me, the other three took me ... from behind. They've been working ... me over ever since."

He won't tell her of how it had felt, being confronted by how own warped mirror image. His face but not his face, his voice but not his voice. The man's voice was nothing like his, it was acting only, but his practiced efforts were enough to chill the soul. His brutality was so unnatural that Tim had felt his only real fear. It was like some chilling 'Twilight Zone' episode, being confronted by his evil twin, some perverse opposite out of a Richard Matheson script. But this man he knew only as 'Green' was nothing like what he'd imagined he might have been save for the course of his own life.

He was infinitely worse.

x

Michelle had heard a version of the story of McGee's night, enough to have no doubt about the method of 'distraction' to which McGee had admitted. She looks up at him, but when she meets his eyes they're not on hers. "Please don't look at me!" She turns away, blushing, humiliated.

"I'm sorry." He closes his eyes.

There had been a time when he would have kept his eyes closed even though all of his friend's torment, but given the alternatives of embarrassment to the woman and what she was suffering rather than allowing him to give in to save her, he owed her. He owed her the dignity of not turning away from what he'd had to allow.

Afterward, it hadn't seemed to make much difference, not with her unconscious. Now he berates himself for his carelessness.

X

Michelle won't allow herself to think of his eyes upon her naked body for so long, no more than she will think of the other men. She won't think of McGee's 'clone' - and what they'd done to her. She forces herself not to think of it - and fails.

'I'm not weak,' she chastises herself sharply, 'and he will not _see_ me weak!'

Later, in Jimmy's arms, she will scream and cry and have a well earned breakdown while comforted by him. Now she cannot – will not – think of it.

x

When she can force herself to look back up he has his eyes discretely closed. "What did they use on you? How'd they cause those burns?" The lines of scorched flesh crisscross his chest, stomach and arms. She suspects his back is equally marked.

"Cattle prod."

"I didn't know those could burn."

"If they're set high enough, held long enough."

She shudders, tries not to think of how long the prod had to be held against his flesh to produce each of those horrendous burns. "Why?" she shifts her hips, trying to get into a position that doesn't hurt so much. There is none. "Why are they doing this?"

He opens his eyes, fixing them only on hers, not allowing himself to see anything else. "They want the Delphi code."

She frowns up at him. After all they've been through "You'll have to do a _lot_ better than that."

"Sorry, it's been a rough two days."

Looking up at his bruised, burned and bloody body, she admires his ability to understate.

x

"NCIS maintains personnel files on all its Agents, past, present and future. Trainees," he elaborates. "They include Personnel and Resource Information Systems, Special Agent Career Development Files, Weapon and Equipment Files, Personal Security Clearance Files along with Supplementary files compiled from dozens of different sources, most of them personal. They're all in one huge, comprehensive database covering thousands of men and women all over the world."

"How comprehensive?" She doesn't like the idea of a file on herself that anyone can access, and those personal files feel a little too complete.

"Totally comprehensive. Where you live, where you spend your free time, the names and locations of your friends, your favorite color, your favorite foods, the breed and name of your _cat_. Everything.

"_Why_?"

"It's intended to be so comprehensive that should an Agent go missing, he has a better chance of being found. It's designed for our safety - our security.

"After 9/11 all the data was encrypted. Beyond the normal Requisition procedures, if you want to access the data you then need a special pass code, which only one agent has."

"Who has it?"

"The records are secure," he assures her, not answering her question. "The encryption codes change completely every couple of months, even the interval varying. I devised the last encryption algorithm, which will last for another two weeks or so, then someone else - I have no idea who or where - will rewrite everything.

"Without a special 11 digit code, which he or she will also rewrite, no one can access the files."

"And with the code?" she does not really want an answer.

"They will know everything about every Agent from first day Probie to long retired NIS Agents in Nursing Homes. They could wipe us all out."

x

Michelle's apprehension morphs into a cold chill that has nothing to do with the concrete floor she lies upon. "Why copy you?"

"So NCIS won't know I'm missing. I'm told my copy, 'Green', has been studying me for months. How did he do?"

Her laugh is a sharp, humorless bark. "He's got too much of a temper. We picked up on that right away. But we thought it was a relapse of the 'Elf Lord' - until he nearly took a swing at Special Agent Gibbs."

"That would have been something to see." He wishes Green had been so stupid - Gibbs would have put him out. "But if he can get the code, all he has to do is input it, unlock the files and transmit them anywhere."

"You can't talk," she reminds him of what he knows so very well. No longer deeply chilled, now she's scared. "Not only will they kill all our friends once they get the information, but that's the only thing that's keeping us alive."

He keeps his eyes locked on hers, refusing to look at her nakedness, saying pointedly "They're not torturing _me_ now."

She meets his eyes and tries to smile encouragingly. "Don't worry about me. I can take it." It's the biggest lie she's told in months. Right now death would even be preferable to a repeat of what they did. The pain was so horrible she couldn't fight it. Only now can she reduce it – a little.

x

Drawing on Wiccan training, she'd managed to contain some of the pain as they abused her, but they had kept breaking her concentration with even worse agonies. She tries now to focus her mind, to concentrate on easing the pain in her abused body, but she knows this is only temporary. Her special focus had always been in relieving pain and she puts all her effort into it, feeling the healing energy flow through her body, a trickle against the flood. Even though she can make some of the pain fade, she knows more and worse is coming. If they can't break him with torture, they'll break him through her.

Without the sustained aid of the Goddess she could not have held out. What the woman, 'Yellow', had done to her had only been a warm up, to break her for the pain to follow. The stabbings and nail scratches had made the rapes that followed that much more agonizing. That's why she couldn't stop screaming or crying. She's hurt so badly she wants to cry again - but she won't. She won't break. "They have no imagination at all;" she lies, "and if they rape me again I'm sure they don't have half of Jimmy's staying power among the three of them."

x

Tim can see through so transparent a lie and knows what this torment has cost her. Between each increasingly brutal assault he'd been offered the chance to end it, to give up the secret, but he couldn't. Even when they had tied her hands above her head and her ankles pulled painfully apart and secured to desk and pipe so the three could take their pleasure on the helpless woman her face couldn't mask her pain and every moment, every scream pain tore at his soul.

He only knows, despite the horrific torture, that he has to keep silent, and it tears his heart apart.

x

As if on cue, the door opens and Michelle watches the blonde woman come in riding a cloud of triumph, holding her hands behind her back. She's followed by her three assistants, 'Brown', 'Black' and 'Green' - the fake McGee. One of them, Black or Brown, Michelle neither knows nor cares which, remains by the door. Looking at this man is the worst, he has the face of her friend and partner, and it's set in an expression of sadistic lust.

Renewed fear grips her, worse than the embarrassment of lying naked and spread wide on the cement floor. She stares up at the men, feeling their eyes invading her, dreading what they are going to do to her next.

It's one thing to try to put up a brave front, but whatever the woman has concealed behind her back worries her more than the pain.

She glares at the bogus McGee, fixing all her hatred on him, unable to believe she had worked with the man for two days. Now she's well able to credit Jimmy's story that the monster had tried to rape Mother O'Mallory. She's sure the Priest has no idea her trusted friend had not–

"A masterful summation," Yellow tells Tim broadly, her voice carrying her victory. The Agents hadn't doubted they were being overheard, but had spoken anyway. They could do nothing about being heard, and Tim had said nothing his captors didn't already know.

Guilt assaults him worse than the pain in his body. To keep silent, to save the entire NCIS, he'd held his tongue at their demands while Michelle had suffered such vicious atrocities at the hands of this soulless bitch.

x

"We knew if they actually suspected you'd disappeared," the woman continues, her tone victorious, "they'd change the code early, making you both quite useless, so I suggest you talk now - and save this pretty young thing a lot_ more_ pain."

"He won't talk," Michelle cuts off whatever Tim would say, "and he really doesn't like me as much as you think - I tend to be an opinionated bitch." She fixes all her hate on the evil monster with McGee's face. "But you _lied_! You didn't rape Mo – Agent O'Mallory," she amends quickly. Green had referred to her as an Agent, and she realizes that revealing O'Mallory's true identity is not a good idea. "She beat you off, Jimmy _saw_ it." She hadn't been able to say it before, relishes revealing the truth now.

The vicious clone takes a step forward, his ploy to weaken Tim ruined by her message. He's about to take his revenge in a powerful kick to her head but Yellow holds him back.

Michelle smiles, sneering contempt in every breath; "But if you _insist_ on raping me use some _lubricant_. You three couldn't moisten a sex-starved _slut_."

"Oh, believe me;" the blonde woman says with a smile more sick than sweet, "you're not going to worry about lubrication ever again."

x

Tim knows their only hope of being rescued before he can be broken is the experimental GPS and Telemetry dot Abby had placed behind his right earlobe so long ago, but the Team isn't going to be looking for him if he is at his desk. He must keep Green here as long as possible, delay him no matter the cost. "_Animal_!" he forces his doppelganger to look up from Michelle. "You hurt, you abuse - you _rape_, you're an _animal_ with no idea how to treat a woman!"

"They get what they deserve," the aanimal with his face declares with his voice.

"You have no _idea_. That's why no one will come near you but _I_ have more women than I can handle. You could _never_ have anyone share herself - body and soul - while I have _three_ who will do anything I ask."

The perversion with his face stalks up to him, raising his fist. "Shut up!"

"Or what?" Still not close enough. "You can't break me any more than you can get any woman –" The charlatan comes in range and Tim's right foot comes up hard, the kick so powerful the man is knocked off his feet. The demon's eyes burn with hellfire fueled by Tim's mocking grin - he's on his feet in an instant.

"GREEN!" the blonde woman's shout is all that halts him. Her hands are still held behind her back. "Don't you see what he's doing? He can't tell us the code if he's unconscious or dead!"

That hadn't quite been Tim's plan, but considering the threat to all of NCIS, he considers it a reasonable alternative.

"I'm not gonna kill him," 'McGee/Green' retorts, "I'm gonna–"

"You're _going_ to come over here and hold her steady - that's what you're going to do!"

"Must be rough." There is no sympathy in Tim's mockery. "You can't get a woman to be nice to you but you have to knuckle down to one."

Ready though Tim is, he's unable to use the same tactic again. The sadist comes in too fast and his fist slams hard into one of the charred wounds. Pain explodes. Tim dangles from the chains, unable to drag air into his lungs, the agony so horrific he's suffocating.

He finally collapses, hanging from the chains, gasping.

"When this is over, you're mine."

"You're ... not my ... type," Tim manages to force his head up, to grin, "but it does … explain a lot."

"GREEN!"

x

The pseudo-McGee halts, furious. He has to follow orders, but adds resentment against the bitch to the fury and vows the hanging man will pay. When this is over, he'll spend a truly enjoyable hour beating McGee to death.

Yellow passes Green, bringing one hand out to shove him toward Lee, her other hand still concealed as she takes Green's place. Now from behind her back she draws a long silver metal rod with an insulated handle.

"Recognize this?" she asks with a saccharine smile. The man at the door enters now, trailing a thick, high voltage cable in his hand. He gives it to Yellow who attaches it to the end of the silver rod. She activates the device and it starts to crackle loudly. She smiles in dreadful anticipation, and steps to the side so Michelle can see everything. "Watch this," she tells the helpless woman.

McGee tries to move back, but the wall's behind him. She touches the end of the rod to Tim's bare stomach for just a moment - he convulses, his body shaking violently and he cries out in agony.

"STOP IT!" Michelle screams and her voice breaks.

The bitch is grinning at her and Michelle tears against the ropes that hold her. Tim is shaking violently, unable to speak, the charge keeping him from breathing.

She breaks the touch and Tim sags in the chains, gasping, his face a gruesome mask. "Just a touch will make a half ton bull jump. Hold it in place and skin starts to sizzle, flesh burn away,"

"You _Bitch_!"

"Held a little longer, flesh sears and fries until it's reduced to charred black meat. It can also electrocute, but that takes a _long time_. He might even suffocate during it."

"If I get out of these ropes–"

"Oh you won't, honey. Not alive at least."

Tim, having managed to catch his breath, looks up and she turns to him. "You've had seconds, up to a minute; imagine what twenty minutes will be like for _her_. Especially when I stick it deep _inside_."

"Don't!"

x

Michelle struggles against the ropes, terrified. The three men take hold of the ropes, pull her legs hard, her wrists are yanked high above her head so her hands redden. She continues struggling, 'Yellow's face turns into a mask of anticipatory delight.

"This will burn and char her flesh," she turns to Michelle, "but very particular, very _special_ flesh. Did you see that Star Wars movie, the one where the Jedi sticks his light saber _inside_ the steel door? Remember how the steel burned and fried, turned red and then white hot, started to melt and slosh away? Well, imagine..."

Satisfied by the dread on their faces, she backs away with a joyous smile and goes down on one knee between Michelle's spread thighs. The men pull the long ropes harder.

Michelle struggles desperately, horrified as she stares wide-eyed at the deadly buzzing, crackling tool the woman slowly brings closer.

She tries not to scream, her desperate whispers calling names none of them know. Before it touches her she feels the charge over her skin and her nerve deserts her, a frightened cry escapes.

x

"SEVEN!" Tim yells.

The woman halts, the crackling rod too close as she looks up, triumphant. "Go on."

"_No_, Agent McGee! Whatever they do, _don't _give them the –!" Yellow touches her vagina and Michelle shrieks, her body convulsing, shaking wildly upon the cement floor. It lasts forever - then she collapses.

Michelle clamps her teeth upon her lips even though it makes it harder to breathe, forces herself to hold back the sobs that tear at her. She won't let the bastards see her pain, barely able to believe the agony of that brief touch. She starts to appreciate what Tim had endured - but his knowledge of that torment is what may break him now. "No, don't," she gasps, ignored. Yellow turns to Tim, her sadistic delight high as she slowly brings the crackling rod closer again.

"FIVE!" Tim calls loudly, seeing Brown has relinquished his hold on the rope securing Michelle's wrists to the worktable and is writing down the code.

"More!"

The crackling metal only a quarter inch away, Michelle tries to hold her hips utterly still even as her chest heaves with terrified gasps. She tries to see the tip down her splayed body, unable to stop their defeat as above her head McGee makes his choice.

"Eight ... one ... zero ... nine …" he admits, beaten.

"Go on."

"NO!" he cries in a flash of determination, "not until you put that thing away!"

"I'll put it here." She releases the button and reaches down to spread Michelle's labia.

x

Michelle struggles wildly but feels the rod enter her inch by inch. She already hurts from the stabbing, scratching and rapes, but the invasion of this metal rod filling her to the limit –

"I turn this on now and I won't stop. I'll fry her to a crisp."

Tim looks down at Michelle, "I'm sorry."

She puts her head down, despite her terror. She's scared of the pain, of the destruction of her inner – but is it worth the lives of everyone in NCIS? "Oh, Agent McGee."

"Oh, _stop_. Tell me the rest of the code."

"Let her go. Please! She's only a Probie, she can't -." The woman presses the trigger and Michelle screams.

"_Eight_!" Tim cries.

The rod is silenced again, Michelle's body stops shaking but she can't stop crying as she collapses. "Last chance."

Tim shakes his head, defeated. In the end, he could not let it happen. "Oh one seven nine. Satisfied?"

"No. Give it to me _backwards._ Fast!" Her finger tightens on the trigger; the prod's crackle muffled within Michelle's body and she shrieks.

"Ninesevenoneoheightnineohoneeightfiveseven _STOP IT_!"

Yellow releases the control, draws the quiet rod back out.

Michelle lies gasping, relieved of the pain and grateful the rod's pulled out of her but deeply ashamed. She's safe, for the moment - but at so terrible a cost.

"We'll keep you alive… for now. No matter how big we are it will take quite a while. But we'll show you the rest of the bodies before you die."

Triumphant, the four file out, no longer caring about their prisoners. As the door is locked, Michelle fights the lingering pain and looks up at Tim, who hangs his head.

Nothing is said. Nothing can be said.


	11. Doomsday

Chapter Eleven  
Doomsday

There have been many occasions when Jennifer Shepherd has had to do something she truly regrets. Those have become far more numerous since the day she first sat behind this desk, but none of them hits home quite as closely, or as painfully, as this one. She's summoned Supervisory Special Agent Gibbs to her office and receives him with heavy heart. "Sit down, Jethro."

x

He wonders at her grim tone. He's already sent up his report on Reignforest and, unhappy though the circumstances are, they don't explain this bleak summons.

She sits for several moments, evidently organizing her thoughts. As she has clearly had an unknown amount of time to do so already, this is bad.

"I hardly know how to say this. If it hadn't come from three different sources I wouldn't believe it. I still can't."

"Am I going to believe it?"

"I doubt it."

"Try me."

x

"Have you noticed anything unusual about Special Agent McGee?"

He's surprised. "You know what he went through when he was the Elf Lord. Foster said he shouldn't be on duty. I overruled him, you backed me. He's been tense lately, out of sorts, he says he doesn't remember any of it but he won't meet my eyes when he says it. Two days ago I believed he doesn't remember Cearbhall. Now I don't."

He watches his old partner's face, she reveals nothing. Her silence forces his words. "For the past two days he's been forgetful, impatient, had outbursts of anger." To Gibbs it sounds bad and is growing worse, so he makes himself insist "but he's been managing."

"Define 'managing'."

Caught, Gibbs can't lie. "He hasn't been himself, not the easygoing McGee I know. I thought he could pull through on this case but he hasn't been carrying his weight. I didn't want to admit it, but he's still not himself."

"You generally don't cut your team any slack."

"And I wouldn't give him any if he hadn't been the 'Elf Lord'. But I pushed him back to work because I felt it was the best thing for him. Yes, we've cut him a little slack, but that'll end."

"We may have given him too much slack, and it's blown up in everyone's faces."

His expression asks his question.

"A few hours ago Security initiated an Internal Alert about an incident on the forward elevator." He'd heard the initial alert but hadn't followed up on it. He'd been busy. "A short time later Mr. Palmer came to me with a story I didn't want to believe. I checked with Mother O'Mallory, who confirmed it."

He can see that whatever's in her mind she really doesn't want to say it.

"A few minutes after the incident with the coffee," Gibbs recalls the embarrassing incident all too well, not certain where Shepherd is going, "Reverend O'Mallory stopped off in the Squad Room on her way out. She and Agent McGee spoke for a few moments and then were seen getting into the elevator." She stops, shaking her head.

"And then?"

"McGee tried to rape her."

x

It has been a very long time since anything has reduced Leroy Jethro Gibbs to speechlessness.

The 'Elf Lord' had not.

This does.

He feels a cold flood of adrenaline fill his body but doesn't try to express disbelief or ask if she's sure. She would never have sent for him unless she was utterly certain.

"Mother O'Mallory is declining to press Charges, citing her long friendship with Agent McGee as well as Christian forgiveness, but you know that doesn't end it."

He knows this all too well. If two others have reported this, it cannot be contained. There will be a Departmental Investigation, then a Hearing before a Review Board which will lead to a Trial Commission. McGee's entire career will be under a microscope, will certainly be destroyed.

Regardless of whether O'Mallory presses Charges, McGee has thrown away his future.

Gibbs is out of his seat so suddenly Shepherd might have been startled. She knows his mind and is up as fast.

"I want to talk to him here!" she declares.

"You can talk to him wherever you like. I'm going to get answers." He crosses the room, yanks open the door.

xx

Reaching the Squad Room a few yards ahead of Shepherd, Gibbs sees only DiNozzo and David at their posts and his voice booms through the room: "Where's McGee?"

"I don't know," DiNozzo replies, startled and glancing at Ziva for confirmation. Gibbs sees another desk that is not supposed to be vacant.

"Where's_ Lee_?" He gets blank looks as responses, never a wise idea. "_Find them_!" He and Shepherd go to his desk.

"Checking main gate egress logs," Tony says to coordinate with Ziva.

"Accessing their cell phones' GPS circuits," Ziva says over the ring of the elevator's arrival bell, "as well as Abby's–"

She never has the chance to report further. McGee strides into the bullpen past Shepherd, goes straight to his desk.

"_McGee_!"

"Yes, boss?" he asks, sitting down.

"Come over here!"

x

'McGee' glances up and sees Gibbs and Shepherd on either side of Gibbs' desk, neither looking happy. Is his cover blown? "Just a second." He reaches for the keyboard, ready to type as fast as he can. He had better access and flash feed the information now.

Gibbs can't believe he's been put off. "_NOW_, McGee!"

McGee hits the keys as quickly as he can, ready to access and transmit the data to the warehouse. He enters the command to bring up Delphi. Once begun, they will never stop it in time. [Enter Priority Code] the computer directs. '75810980179' - 'Enter'.

Every alarm bell, every siren, every klaxon in the room, in the building, in the sector, in the entire Navy Yard screams out at once!

x

Jenny Shepherd, closest to McGee, runs in fighting the pain of the noise as he leaps up, draws his gun, aims under the desk and shootsthe computer!

Three shots blast out as Agents throughout the room dive for cover, reach for and aim their own weapons. They come up behind what cover they may, unable to believe as they search rapidly for a target in the earsplitting din, that one of their own just _shot_ his computer.

Jenny slams to a halt so hard she continues forward for another half step, off balance, unable to prevent McGee from reaching out with his left hand. He grabs her blouse and yanks her to him, spins her about into a tight grip, his arm about her throat, his gun pressed to her right temple.

"Nobody move!" he shouts over the blaring bells and horns and sirens. "Nobody _fuckin'_ move or I blow her _fuckin' brains_ out!"

x

They know this shocking threat is empty. If he kills her he dies at the guns of two dozen Agents, but no one is willing to take the chance. Their Sigs are converged upon him, or more accurately on Director Shepherd, but for them to fire she must be dead.

Gibbs, looking into the wild eyes of his Agent, watching him holding a Sig pressed to Shepherd's head, feels the world tilt. "Lower your weapons," he orders in a carefully level voice, his words barely audible over the noise. Slowly, two dozen guns descend from the incredible tableau. "Talk to us, McGee."

He doesn't get a chance, for one gun remains trained upon him. Ziva, to his left, stands with her supported gun steady. "Tim..."

Her intense word cuts through the loud ringing and honking and whining. McGee turns, sees the gun aimed at him and brings his own gun out past Jennifer's body.

One loud shot shatters the air. McGee's head jerks back. Driven backward, his grip on Shepherd drags her after him but she twists out, barely staying on her feet to wind up near Michelle's desk. McGee slams to the floor across the front of his own desk. The small hole in his forehead belies the large, grizzly bloody hole in back. A spray of blood covers his desk and the rear wall.

There are no words anyone can say as the Agents gather, surrounding the still body of Timothy McGee. He stares upward at nothing, the noise driving away all thought, all reason.

x

Shepherd's phone call quiets the Alert, enough for Gibbs to turn on Ziva. "_Why_?"

"I love Tim more than any man in this world."

"You got a funny way of _showing _it, lady!" DiNozzo is no longer sure which of them had been crazy.

"That is not Tim. I know Tim and that was not him." She shakes herself out of the horrifying place her mind had momentarily trapped her. "Aside from the way he spoke and acted, that man shot his _computer_ and while restraining Director Shepherd with his left arm, he was holding his Sig with his right hand."

Thinking back over the tense moments, the Agents realize they'd missed this vital point. McGee would no more use his right hand under duress than they would risk shooting with their left.

"That's loose logic for blowing his head apart!" Tony's anger is high as he turns from the prone body.

"Is it, Tony? Then how about this? The GPS tag Abby put upon Tim a couple of weeks ago came in, but neither his nor Michelle Lee's cell phone signals are in the bi-state area." She picks up the remote for the plasma screen and turns the unit on, a city map appears, copied from her computer screen. "The telemetry readings are way off, I can not read them," she admits, for the very first time actually wishing for Abby's presence; she could interpret them. "But _that_ is Tim McGee!"

One red dot flashes on the map, beside which is an eight digit code. "Zoom in on that." Gibbs commands. Five successive enlargements set aside a block wide area and a single building. "Move out!"

xxx

"Agent McGee," Michelle wishes she could close her legs or put on something - anything - but forces herself to pretend that it doesn't matter, at least in front of McGee. She won't ask him again to close his eyes, he's not the first man to see her naked. Tied up, yes, but not naked.

"Call me Tim. There's no need to always be so formal." He'd meant to tell her that weeks ago, not now when they're so close to the end. He can see her reluctance remain.

"I was brought up to always respect my–. Well, I was brought up _very_ strictly. I could never be familiar without permission. It's … well, it's not _done_."

Tim had long wondered why Abby was the only one ever comfortably addressed by name. It's like she pushes herself each time she does it with one of the team. He manages a smile despite the pain. "I give you permission."

"Tim…" she tries it, uncertain of the flavor, "may I ask a favor?"

"Of course." He's not sure he's in a position to grant any, but hopes for the future.

"When we get out of this, please don't tell anyone what they did to me. I don't want it getting back to Jimmy." He supposes she can read his surprise all too well. "He has enough on his mind with what happened with George Franklin."

Tim is astounded. 'Enough on his mind'? His fiancé is tortured, raped - seven times! - nearly killed, could still die and–'

"He's having a pretty hard life this time;" she continues. "He's had better, but in this life - recently - he has a lot of baggage. I don't want to add to–"

"Wait a second – this life? What do you mean _this_ life?"

x

She smiles up at him. So few understand the truth. "Souls from the past have nearly unlimited rebirth. He and I are Soul-Mates, constantly meeting in one century after another. Jimmy and I have been together for millennia."

This is a little too much to take, especially now. "What, you've always been his wife?"

She shrugs, "Sometimes I'm the husband, sometimes we're the same sex and we're bosom buddies. I remember us as Knights Templar during the Crusades. Sometimes the timing is a bit off and one of us is the child of the other, _that's_ always interesting. This time he's the man and I'm the woman," she grins lasciviously despite her pain, "and that's pretty interesting in itself."

"This is incredible," he says, shaking his head. It's also incredible that she would be concerned about this now, when they're about to die and he's not going to be able to reveal anything to Palmer.

Perhaps it's this belief in her own version of the immortality of the soul that allows her to discuss such things rather than dwelling on their imminent death. He, however, has no such high hopes.

x

"That's why I don't want to hurt him, and even though I could die here I care more about how he'd feel in this life without me. I _know_ we'll be together again, maybe in this century, we've a lot of it left, maybe in the next - but I still don't want to miss this life with him."

Tim barely knows how to credit any of this, but "I promise. I won't say a word, though I have my doubts about us getting out of this alive."

"I don't. You'll get us out." This declaration is so assured he cannot credit it either.

"How do you know we're going to survive this?"

"Oh," her voice is so light that it comes out as forced as it really is, "I cast my horoscope a few days ago and today's not a Death Day. Last Tuesday and next Thursday are Death Days, today's a Life Day."

He is unsure if he should be amused or amazed, "I wish I had your faith."

"The Goddess sustains me, even as the Triune God sustains you – and me."

The curious phrasing distracts him from their troubles, at least for the moment. "Michelle, would you tell me something? Call it a last request."

"If I can."

"You're a Witch; a Wiccan and a follower of the Old Celtic religion."

"Right."

"But you're also a practicing Episcopalian - a Christian." She nods. "How do you reconcile that?"

"Jimmy asked me pretty much the same question some time ago."

"What did you tell him?"

"'It gives me headaches'."

Were the situation not so grim, he would laugh, but "Come on, I really want to know."

"Why?"

"I hate dying without all the mysteries solved."

She chuckles. "Okay, it's not really all that difficult: it's just–"

x

The warehouse door's exploding inward crashes through the building. "_Federal Agents_! _Drop Your Weapons_!" A moment later the first of the gunshots begin, loud inside the warehouse, no pattern to the wild beat. Many come together, then spread out, barrages alternating with single or paired shots.

Tim and Michelle long to escape the deadly barrage. Neither can escape. Michelle is still tied upon the cement floor, Tim still hangs from the chains which dig deeply into his wrists. Both are too aware that the room they are in is nothing but plywood and–

In answer to Tim's thought a bullet smashes through the wall and misses his ribs so closely he can feel its passing before it slams into the wall behind him.

"Watch your fire," he yells, "we're in here!"

Only three more shots sound through the wood, then several seconds later a massive impact hits the door. It flies off its hinges, revealing two NCIS Operatives, a heavy steel battering ram held between them. They give way to Gibbs, DiNozzo and David who burst in, guns ready. Finding no more targets, they raise their weapons, then reholster them, taking in the scene.

David strips off her black jacket and spreads it to cover the humiliated woman, then receives Gibbs' and DiNozzo's, covering Michelle from shoulders to knees. Then they pull out knives and cut the ropes that hold her legs spread so obscenely wide.

Ziva goes to Tim but Gibbs directs her to help Michelle while they attend to McGee, positioning that places the men's backs to the two women.

"Do you know where the key is?" Gibbs asks, looking at the locked manacles that hold Tim.

"One of them has it."

Gibbs' look leaves Tony no need for words. He doesn't glance at the two women at the floor as he leaves to search the bodies. As he exits the room DiNozzo calls a general order to the Agents assembled outside for them to help in the search for the key, not confining the search to the three bodies.

Gibbs opens his cell phone, summoning Ducky. Given the choice of their own Medical team or an anonymous Ambulance crew, he has numerous reasons for choosing their own.

The key is swiftly found in the pocket of one of the two men and McGee is carefully eased down, the assisting Agents mindful of his multitude of burns and injuries.

Though Michelle's clothes had been destroyed, she wears Gibbs' jacket and uses Tony's as a skirt. She sits in a corner with Ziva, who quietly assists her. Gibbs is particularly chagrinned to learn that her call for help, made so long ago, still resides in his cell phone's voice mail.


	12. Epilogues

Chapter Twelve  
Epilogue One

Jennifer Shepherd is angry when she arrives at McGee's apartment. She still can't believe they decided to bring him home rather than to make him remain in the hospital following his Emergency Room treatment. She knows Agent Lee has remained in the hospital with Mr. Palmer; at least she was smart.

She's prepared to overrule Ducky, Gibbs and McGee himself as soon as she lays eyes on the man. She can look in on both of them in Bethesda. Admitted by Agent DiNozzo, greeting him with curt words, she stalks two rights around the corner past his computer station and into his bedroom.

McGee is lying on his bed, covered in bandages which obscure the worst of his wounds and burns and the sight of him appalls her. The bruises that mottle his face and upper body, as much as can be discerned above the level of his blanket, bear sharp testament to his pains. She's heard about the burns, but there's a horrific number of coverings.

Seated next to him is Ducky, Ziva on the near side, her back to Shepherd, Gibbs standing next to the dresser on the far right. DiNozzo follows her into the now fairly crowded room.

"Agent McGee, how are you?"

He looks at her, bleary-eyed. He doesn't seem able to focus on her. "Eyev fel' bet-te." His voice is so heavily slurred she can barely understand him.

Ducky catches her eye. He steps over to her where he can speak without being overheard.

"I've given him medications that will both ease the pain and allow him to sleep. They're taking effect now." He consults his watch. "They will also keep him asleep until at least the morning, and when he awakens he'll find himself back in the hospital."

"That's good." It saves her the unpleasantness of overruling McGee's decision. Collectively, they'll do what is best for him despite his wishes.

x

She steps closer to the bed, addresses him as distinctly as she can. "You're going to be all right."

He struggles to focus. "Saaa – rah? Y-u shu bee en skool..."

"Rest well," she advises with a smile, patting his arm on one of the few places not bruised or burned. His wrists, which had bourn his weight on steel manacles for nearly two days, are heavily bandaged and she has no wish to see them. She turns to Gibbs. "Do you know who they were?"

"Home growns," he answers succinctly, referring to native born terrorists. "Lamb's team is running them down, we'll have IDs soon enough. And when they're ID'd, I'm sure we'll find they're funded through a numbered Swiss Bank Account."

"No bet there."

Jennifer looks about. There are several people conspicuous by their absence, but she knows where Jimmy and Michelle are. There's one left. "Where's Abby?"

Ducky has seated himself again at the bedside and continues applying coverage to McGee's wounds. "I gave Mr. Palmer the evening off so he could take appropriate care of Agent Lee." He doesn't mention that Michelle had adamantly refused to allow him to examine or treat her injuries. A brief description of the circumstances while McGee had still been lucid, though he could tell the man was holding back a vast amount, was enough to inform him of more than he felt he wanted to know.

x

"Abby's in her lab, examining the evidence," Gibbs tells her. He doesn't tell her that this separation had been intentional. With both Abby and Ziva trying to tend to him, he doubts McGee would get any rest, medications or no.

As if by some quirk of cosmic Fate, his cell phone rings. He tugs it from his pocket, sees the name displayed and presses the speaker button so he doesn't have to repeat what he'll be told later. "Gibbs."

An anxious voice fairly leaps out of the phone. /Gibbs I have IDs on the fingerprints of two of them how's Tim tell him I'll get there the minute I–/

"He has to rest, Abs," he denies, cutting off her rush "Ducky gave him something to relax him, but he does thank you for that tracer thingy you put on his ear." Gibbs doesn't want to say aloud what will happen once the man is thoroughly asleep. He will awaken back in the hospital, his clothing returned here to prevent an early self-release.

/Oh, okay, I'll see him in the–/

"You have _work_ to do, Abby." He had already given Ziva until 10:00 in the morning off, DiNozzo will have to sub for the three absent Agents. There is too much hunting to do.

/Yes, I won't be late./

"The fingerprints!"

/Oh! Yes, well, the woman is Natasha Klein, a professional bitch with sadistic personality up the wazoo. I'll have her bio uploaded to your computer in a few minutes. She's got a BOLO out from everyone you can think of, though the FBI wants her for suspected Terrorist connections with Al Qaeda. She disappeared off the radar a couple of months ago. No record of her leaving the country; not that that tells us any truth.../

"Abby." This is old ground she would traverse.

/Yes, okay. Well, anyway, the phony McGee was Dennis Whitney from Nevada - tell Ziva thanks for shooting him. He's been busted for everything from shoplifting to aggravated assault and wife-beating. He been arrested for rape with battery so many times I can't believe he's not doing Life. Before she divorced him, his wife claimed he would beat and rape her - his claim is that he's keeping his property in line. Sounds pretty familiar if you ask me, like another sicko we know./ He knows the particular 'sicko' to which she refers, the religious zealot Greg Martin, who he'd had his fill of when they'd investigated him as part of the Wiccan murder case. /The Judge probably signed the decree before he even shut up. He looked a lot like McGee to begin with, they didn't have to do all that much to complete the disguise./

"That it?"

/Gee, Gibbs, how many miracles do you _want_ in two hours?/

Gibbs snaps the phone closed.

Whatever reply Shepherd is about to give is interrupted by heavy pounding at McGee's front door.

x

It took Siobhan O'Mallory quite some time to nurse misery into an apoplectic fury. She's whet and sharpened it into a fine sharp rage that allows her to put aside her normal inclination to forgive, to understand, to grant Christian love. She just wants to confront the friend - the man who had hurt and betrayed her. That it was Timmy who had hurt her so brutally only makes the pain worse. Rather than putting it aside, however, she latches onto it, fuels it into incendiary rage that'll enable her to demand the justice that's her due.

That her nerves are already strained, almost overwhelmed by a more unnerving torment she'd originally wanted to talk to her _friend _about only adds extra fuel to the conflagration. She pounds harder on the door.

Father George Donaldson drove her here, saying he wanted to be not just support for his partner but a counselor for moderation. He'd said in the car he's afraid Siobhan's anger may cause her to completely lose control, and fearful of what she might do in her boiling rage.

She'd never let him see her truly angry, so out of control with rage. Even at the capture of Charlie Morley she had maintained her self control. Now she'll abandon it.

She pounds on the wooden door as hard as she can, finding a wellspring of greater force in her rage.

"Open this door!" she yells, hitting the wood harder. "Timmy, I saw your light on; I know you're in there!" She actually kicks the door, surprising her partner who only thought her rage out of control. "_Open this__ damn_–!"

"Who is it?" The voice from within asks.

"Siobhan! I'm here with Father Donaldson and I want to _talk_ to you!" Her voice rises to the point where Donaldson fears every other apartment door on this floor will open instead. "If you do not open this door _right now_ I am going to the _Police_ and I'm going to–!"

x

The door opens but it is not McGee on the other side. Agent DiNozzo regards her quite bemusedly. "Please, come in."

Surprised, they accept his quiet invitation, but Siobhan turns to confront DiNozzo as he closes the door. "I didn't know anyone was here, but perhaps the more witnesses the better!" She looks around the room. "Where's _Timmy_?"

DiNozzo, surprised at being confronted by the two Priests, Donaldson looking grim and O'Mallory's rage-filled face as red as her fiery hair, glances to his left, "In the bedroom with Doctor Mallard." He's shocked as Siobhan _shoves _past him. "Where are you going?"

"He's going to _need_ a Coroner by the time I'm through!" She stalks across the room, turns right through the open door into the bedroom, "Timothy McGee, you _basssss_–!"

She slams to a halt, astonishment washing the fury from her face as she stares at the incredible tableau.

x

Tim McGee lies on his bed, partially propped on a stack of pillows, head and bare upper body covered in bruises, bandages and tape. Jenny, Agent Gibbs and Officer David are spread about the room. Ducky sits on the edge of the bed, and all look quite surprised by her fiery entrance. But she cannot tear her eyes off her former friend, who in turn looks at her quite fuzzily.

She'd imagined doing this to him, but the sudden reality–

"What in God's name happened?" she breathes.

x

"Hiii, Shaaav," Timmy greets her, his slowed voice slurred by the injuries to his face and the medications that are controlling the pain. He'd been almost asleep until the pounding and yelling allowed him to fight off the effect of the drugs, at least for a few more moments.

"Timothy has had a very trying two days," Ducky tells her, adding another strip of gauze to his chest. In the tray beside him are several discarded strips red with blood. "He _should _be back in the hospital, but I think you already know how stubborn he can be."

"Two … _Days_?" She can't take her eyes off him, appalled at the extent of his injuries.

"Yes, we rescued him late this afternoon from mercenaries, some of whom we have yet to identify."

"But two days, that's - that's _impossible_!" It's only been a few hours since he'd tried to rape her in that elevator. Since then, he's clearly been thoroughly beaten - even more so than she'd longed to do.

"The man you're thinking of," Ducky explains, "was not Timothy. It was a man named Dennis Whitney, a thoroughly disreputable person as I understand it. He and three others have, over the course of two days, done _this_ to Timothy."

"It's what I was about to explain," DiNozzo tells her from the doorway behind her, "but you were so anxious to visit. They captured McGee the evening before last. One of their Operatives, who had looked like him to begin with - training and surgery probably took care of the rest - had been impersonating him, rather badly actually. We'll know who the rest of them were soon."

He comes around to face the appalled woman. "They wanted information that could have killed a lot of nice people, did a lot of very nasty things to him to try to make him give it up, but he held out for two days until he managed to ruin their plans and we got him out. They wanted the 'Delphi' code; he gave them the 'Doomsday' code instead. It made a racket I'm surprised you didn't hear."

"Sha - aav," Tim says quietly, barely able to speak, fighting the medication that still tries to make him sleep. "Thy tol m' wha hee diiid."

"No, forget about that." She doesn't want to remember it ever again, so long as she knows _Timmy_ is not the one who had…. She goes to the bed, her hand lightly touching his bruised face. "Is there anything I can do?"

He reaches out, his hand on hers as she touches his cheek, and she tries not to react to the bandages wrapped about his wrist. "Thisss helpsss," he tells her gratefully.

Epilogue Two

The jangling of the telephone inches from her right ear jars Jennifer Shepherd awake. She opens her eyes into the blackness of her bedroom, turning to the clock on the night table beside her, forcing her focus on the red numbers that proclaim '3:26'.

'Al Bell, I hate you,' she thinks bitterly as she reaches into the darkness, her hand closing on the phone, silencing the noise. As Director of NCIS, she is far too used to late night interruptions. She'd installed a phone with an extra loud ringer so she wouldn't miss urgent calls, but that doesn't mean she has to like them. "Shepherd."

"Director, Fred Higgins," the Supervisor of one of the four Gamma Shift teams tells her, "I'm sorry to wake you but you wanted this information as soon as it came in."

"Yes."

"Natasha Klein's records show large deposits transferred from a Swiss Bank, the same account that funded Dr. Samuel Richards' mind control experiments. We are now certain that those two operations, and those of Dr. John Carson's attempt to steal the Photon Density Converter's plans, are all funded by the same people."

"Call the Team Leaders. Conference in MTAC 0700."

Next Episode: 'John 8:7'.

When he perceived having only a choice of remaining an Agent or protecting his sister Sarah, Tim McGee had resigned from NCIS, albeit briefly. Now Tim must finally choose where his loyalties lie. Shall he stay within the boundaries of the Agency or sacrifice the law to save the guilty?

Growing storm clouds loom over the Agents, secrets of the past threaten to unravel the present and tragic death heralds the outbreak of War.


End file.
